Lily's Grace
by meayca789
Summary: What if Lily gave Snape one final chance to redeem himself after he called her a mudblood that fateful day in fifth year?
1. Chapter 1: Lily's Grace

Chapter 1

"Fine," Lily said. "I won't help in the future. And I'd wash my pants if I were you, _Snivellus_."

As she stalked away, Severus spat the leftover soap from his mouth and gripped his robes numbly. He'd called Lily a mudblood. A _mudblood_.

"Who wants to see me take off Snivelley's pants?" Potter crowed.

Severus turned a dull glare on Potter. It was Potter's fault, his and Black's. How did Lily expect him to keep his temper with those loathsome Gryffindors beatimg him up every chance they got?

With a casual flick of his wrist, Potter had Severus dangling upside down once again. Severus swore loudly as the blood began pounding in his ears, but he hadn't raised a hand to defend himself. Lily was right.

Severus spent the evening reading back over his OWL papers in the corner of his common room, hoping no one had seen his humiliation that afternoon. The whole place smelled like sour alcohol—several of the Slytherins had just downed five bottles of firewhiskey to celebrate the end of Defense Against the Dark Arts. They were just years from getting their Dark Marks, and they'd gone through the defense classes with the lowest grades they could manage without getting kicked out of school.

"Hey—hey, Severus," Roth called from the bedroom doorway. Lemme see your herby—your herbology essay."

Severus looked up with a sigh. Roth was swaying in place. "No way. You stole my strengthening solution last week, remember?"

Roth laughed crudely. "I saw you this afternoon. Pissed your pants, didn't you?"

Severus shuffled his papers together angrily. The Dark Lord knew what power was; he would value Severus more than any of these louts. Roth and Potter and Black wouldn't matter then.

"Write your own damn essay," Severus said.

Roth lumbered forward unsteadily. "I'll tell your friends, swear—I swear I'll tell them. They didn't see you, huh?"

Severus cursed loudly, but after a moment he yanked the essay out of his bag and thrust it to the floor at Roth's feet. He wouldn't b able to survive two more years here if his friends turned against him.

When the other Slytherins finally stumbled up to bed, Severus threw his bag into the corner and left the common room. The dungeon hallways were cold this late at night, even in late spring, and Severus tucked his hands into the sleeves of his robes as he hurried up the stairs. He had been restless and unhappy all afternoon, unable to settle to anything. He had to make it up to Lily.

Just as he'd hoped, the step outside of the Gryffindor tower was silent and deserted. The Fat Lady frowned at him as he sank down against the wall, but she recognized him. He'd come up here often enough that she sometimes had a friendly word for him. Not tonight, though.

"Out of bed after hours?" the Fat Lady asked severely.

Severus nodded and wrapped his arms around his knees. "I'm not planning to get caught."

And even if he got detention every night for a year, it would be worth it if Lily forgave him. She was the only person Severus truly cared for. They'd been drifting apart this past year, but everything that had come between them had been Severus's fault, and he hated himself for it. This summer would be different.

The Fat Lady rose and left after a while, and the lights along the staircase dimmed. Severus tried to pass the time thinking about the new spell he'd been developing, but his thoughts kept going back to Lily. She would forgive him, she always did; she was too sweet to turn him away. No, she would never speak to him again. Severus wiped his icy palms on his robes.

Finally the portrait hole creaked open, but it was a girl Severus didn't know who peered out at him.

"Won't you go to bed?" she asked nervously.

"No."

The girl's head disappeared, and a few minutes later Lily climbed through the portrait hole. Severus's heart leapt.

"I'm so sorry about earlier," Severus said, jumping to his feet. "I didn't know what I was saying; it just slipped out."

Lily gave him a flat stare as the portrait hole swung closed behind her. "I know. You call everyone else like me a mudblood; why should I be any different?" She drew a sharp breath. "I only came out here because Mary said you'd been here for hours. Go to bed, Sev. We can't be friends any longer, not like this."

"No!" Severus nearly grabbed her arm, but she would have gotten even angrier about that.

Lily turned to leave, flipping her hair over one shoulder. Then she froze. "Oh, no."

The portrait was empty, the Fat Lady still away.

Lily rapped on the blank canvas, perhaps hoping that her friend was still around.

"Don't do that!" Severus touched her shoulder and then pulled his hand quickly away. "You'll wake the whole school."

"Now look where you've gotten us, you prat," Lily snapped. "Well, I'm not going to stand around waiting for a teacher. Don't you dare follow me."

Crossing her arms, Lily turned and stalked down to the stairs, where she began marching past snoring portraits.

Severus paused for about five seconds before hurrying after her. She hadn't threatened to go to McGonagall yet, which she had done in the past. He still had a chance. Lily said nothing as Severus fell into step beside her, trying not to trip over the dark steps, so he took advantage of her silence to apologize yet again.

"Listen, Lily, you know I didn't mean what I said. I just lost my temper, okay?" Severus looked sideways at Lily, trying to decipher her expression. "I was acting like Potter expected, like a slimy old Slytherin insulting the girl he fancies. But it's nothing, I swear. Just an act."

Lily turned around a dark corner, her frown deepening as her robes whipped across the stone.

"Oh, yeah?" she said icily. "And will it still be an _act_ when you start torturing muggles, like the rest of your little Death Eater gang?"

Severus winced. Hearing the stories of his friends' exploits always left a rotten taste in his mouth, but he had hoped Lily hadn't gotten wind of those incidents.

"And you once asked me why I detest them," Lily said sharply when Severus was silent. "Now I'm serious, you have to stop following me."

"How are Potter and Black any better than—what was that?" Severus froze at the creak of a door.

They were almost to the entrance hall. When a pair of soft voices drifted down the stairs, Lily and Severus shared a stricken look. Then Lily darted into the shadows, grabbed a fistful of Severus's robes, and pulled him down beside her. They were so close that Severus could feel her warmth, and for a second he was back in the park near their neighborhood, leaning against a tree with Lily's fiery hair pooled on his shoulder.

"We should go outside," he whispered, blinking away the bright memory. "If we stay here, we might get caught. Besides, the moon will be out." And it was nowhere near full, so they wouldn't run across the idiot Lupin anywhere on the grounds.

"Don't be stupid." Lily moved away from him and set her jaw. "How do I know you're not just trying to lure me into some Death Eater ritual?"

That hurt. Severus lowered his eyes and stared glumly at a stream of moonlight on the flagstones, wondering when Lily had started seeing him this way. How long had it been since she'd smiled at him with those beautiful eyes of hers?

For a long time they sat in silence. Then the professors' voices rose towards them again.

"…recruiting so openly?" one muttered.

"Great evil will certainly come of this," the second responded. Dumbledore—it sounded like Dumbledore. "But the ministry has been tightening its grip on Hogwarts. We cannot intervene until the incidents become worse."

Lily jabbed Severus in the side, and he started.

"You win," she whispered. "Let's get out of here."

Ducking his head to hide a grin, Severus crept out from the shadows with his back pressed against the wall. With a swirl of sharp night air, they were outside, the crescent moon gleaming on the walls behind them. Lily wrapped her arms around her shoulders, shivering visibly—she only wore a thin cloak over her pajamas. Severus resisted the urge to put his arms around her.

"Okay, Sev." Lily sounded exasperated but no longer angry. "What do you actually want from me?"

"I just want to talk," Severus said diffidently.

They began to pace down the silvery lawn towards the lake, the breeze swirling their robes behind them.

"You've known me for years," Severus said. "You know I'm not evil. Why are you so scared?"

"I'm not _scared_. But you played some really nasty tricks on Petunia a few years ago, and you can't blame those on your awful friends. I'm worried that you're not as innocent as I always thought. And if there's some nasty part of you, this Death Eater business is just encouraging it."

"Petunia's a brat," Severus said. "She deserved that, you know she did."

Lily clicked her tongue in disapproval. "That's not the point. I'm afraid of what you might become, especially if you join You-Know-Who. And don't say you won't; I know what you're planning."

Severus clenched his hands together. He wanted to tell Lily that she was wrong, that he would become whoever she wanted him to be, but it would be a worthless lie.

They could hear the lake now, the water lapping at the stone shore, and in a moment they had reached the narrow, sandy beach where they'd eaten picnics and teased the giant squid as second years. Lily sank down cross-legged and Severus knelt beside her. The sand was icy on his knees. For a while they sat in silence, listening to the gurgling water and the fluttering leaves. This was the longest that Severus had had Lily to himself in months, and he didn't want to ruin the moment with renewed arguing.

"I'm working on a new spell," Severus said at last. He hadn't mentioned this to anyone else, but more than once he'd imagined telling Lily.

"Oh, no. Not another one."

Severus was hurt. "What do you mean? You have no idea how much research it takes—hours and hours in the library, and then hundreds of tries before I get the wording and the wand movement just right, and—"

"I'm sorry, Sev." Lily tossed a stone into the lake, where it sank with a plop and a gurgle. "Don't be offended, but a lot of your spells—well, they're not very nice." She shook her head, still staring out across the water. "Sectumsempra, even Levicorpus—it's just for a laugh, sure, but people like James can use them against you. This afternoon—"

Severus stiffened. "Don't speak about that." When Lily was silent, he took a deep breath and tried to stay calm.

"Well, tell me about your new spell," Lily said reluctantly. Severus imagined her rolling her eyes.

"Don't be that way. It's not like the others. No, really, this is more like the reverse of Sectumsempra. A way to—to knit your skin back together." Severus was getting excited now. "Just think of how much that would help healers. If they could patch someone up with a simple spell, instead of carrying around ten different potions, it would revolutionize the healing system."

At last Lily turned and looked at Severus, her eyes wide and shining. "Oh, Sev, that would be wonderful." She lifted one pale hand and placed it gently on Severus's knee. "I had no idea you cared about that."

Severus nodded and shyly put his hand over Lily's fingers. "Of course. The Dark Arts are fascinating, you know—seductive and ever-changing—but healing things, putting them back together, is even better. It's like the whole universe might come together into one giant jigsaw puzzle. It might start to make sense."

Lily nodded, her eyes still alight, and Severus grew bolder. Curling his fingers through hers, he lifted a hand and stroked a flyaway strand of her hair. She had let him play with her hair as a child, but it had been years since he'd dared to touch her like that.

Her mouth tightening, Lily uncrossed her legs and rose. Their hands were still twined, so she pulled Severus up with her.

"Let me prove that I'm still good," Severus whispered. "This summer, just give me a chance."

Lily lowered her eyes and nodded. "You know I will." Then she released Severus's hand and turned away from the lake. In silence, they followed a path of moonlight up to the castle doors. Within the walls of the sleeping school, they parted ways.


	2. Chapter 2: Spinner's End

Chapter 2

The last of their OWLs were over in a flurry of studying and partying, and suddenly it was nearly summer break. Severus did not try to speak to Lily again, but whenever he caught her eye in class or across the great hall, she gave him a brief, radiant smile. He'd never seen her smile like that to anyone else, and he took it to mean she'd regained her faith in him.

Severus grew happier still as the days wound down towards summer, so much that he was able to smile wryly when Gryffindor won the House Cup for the second year in a row. Slughorn grew red in the face at the announcement, and turned to say something to the headmaster, but Severus was not surprised. None of the Hogwarts teachers liked Death Eaters.

The morning of the ride back to London dawned rainy and cool, and Severus's robes were soaked by the time he clambered onto the train. Potter caught him with a trip jinx on his way down the aisle, and Severus retaliated so quickly, throwing Potter off his feet, that the compartment full of Gryffindors didn't have time to react.

"Nice one, Snape," Avery said as they joined their friends at last.

"Pulled another one on Potter?" Mulciber asked, a smirk crossing his broad face.

Severus nodded. His wet robes were icy on his skin, but he didn't want to change into his wretched muggle clothing until he was alone at home.

Bellatrix seemed to be thinking along the same lines. "No money for clothes?" she asked haughtily. "You look like a fool, and you're dripping all over the seat."

"I forgot; they're packed in my trunk, in the luggage compartment," Severus said sourly. He noticed that Bellatrix and Wilkes had already changed, though their sleek dragonhide garments would never pass for muggle attire.

"You still planning to visit Durmstrang?" Avery asked Wilkes.

Wilkes nodded, his pinched face lighting up. "Ad me dad's gonna take us to a dragon reserve, too. They've got Ukranian Ironbellies, he says." Wilkes' father had taught at Durmstrang for a while, so Wilkes often spent his holiday in Russia.

"What about you, Snape?" Avery turned to Severus. "You still won't tell us what you're doing this summer."

"That's because I'm doing nothing."

"Liar," Bellatrix crowed. "Malfoy invited us five times to stay at his manor, but you turned him down. You love Malfoy, so you must have something planned."

Severus shook his head quickly. "Just work. Hey, Bellatrix, could you murder your cousin for me if you get a chance?"

Bellatrix smiled, showing her teeth. "Gladly. I still can't believe you let him beat you up that badly."

"Shut up," Severus growled.

The rest of the train ride passed uneventfully, and by the time they reached King's Cross they had made plans to meet in Knockturn Alley before the end of July.

Lily's mother was waiting for her just past the barrier, a sour-faced Petunia sulking nearby. Lily beckoned Severus over to say hello to Mrs. Evans, and together they described their school year and the impending OWL results as best they could to a muggle. Severus was grateful for the excuse to stand around, because his own mother was nowhere to be seen.

"Oh, do ride back with us," Mrs. Evans said once most of the students and their families had dispersed. "We'll stop by your place on the way home, just to let your parents know you're safe. But you have to stay for dinner."

Lily smiled at Severus, and he found himself nodding eagerly to Mrs. Evans.

"Thank you very much. I would like that." He didn't point out that his mother had probably forgotten about him completely, and would be more worried by his reappearance than by his continued absence.

At the car, Petunia stood with her arms crossed for a long time before reluctantly sliding into the back seat next to Severus.

"Don't you have any friends at that freak school of yours?" she hissed. "We don't want you around."

Severus stuffed his hands into the sleeves of his robes and ignored her.

As they drove through steadily narrower and darker streets approaching Spinner's End, Severus hunched forward in his seat, the usual gloom settling over him.

"Which one is yours, dear?" Mrs. Evans asked over her shoulder. "I always forget."

"There, at the end," Severus said. "Next to the rubbish bin."

Mrs. Evans pulled up right beside the rotting garbage, and Lily climbed out out help Severus with his trunk. When Severus pushed open the heavy front door, he heard a squeak form near the floor.

"Good gracious, don't surprise me like that!"

It was his mother.

"Is school out already? It seems like you're home earlier each year."

"Sorry, Mum," Severus said, heaving his trunk over the doorframe and dropping it awkwardly in a mound of dust. "What are you doing?" Behind him, Lily stood uncertainly on the top stair, holding open the door.

"Oh, just rearranging a few books," his mum said airily. She gave Severus a helpless smile.

Severus frowned. His mum was so slight and insubstantial, as though someone had tried vanishing her and had only half succeeded. His father had probably been throwing things at her again.

"Well, I'll be back after supper," he said. "See you."

Severus turned sharply away from the pitiful sight of his mum and snapped the door shut.

"C'mon," he muttered, not meeting Lily's eyes.

At the Evans' house, Severus steeled himself to act impeccably polite and charming. If he was going to convince Lily that he could change, he had to do it right.

He already didn't belong in her colorful, summery house, and the black robes he still wore marked him as sinister and foreign. It was an effort not to duck his chin and try to hide behind his stringy black hair.

"Your—er—garden looks lovely, Mrs. Evans," he said with a painful smile.

"Why, thank you, dear." Mrs. Evans looked flattered.

The compliments grew easier as the night progressed.

"Delicious casserole, Mrs. Evans."

"Those flowers are very nice. Water lilies, aren't they?"

"Did you bake this bread yourself? It's superb."

Lily caught Severus's eye and beamed at him. He grinned back, and hardly heard Petunia's nasty jibe about his robes.

At last, when the streetlamps had blossomed along the dark street and Petunia had vanished upstairs, Severus got to his feet and said goodnight.

"Do come over again soon," Mrs. Evans said, sweeping around the table and clearing away their plates. "We would love to have you for dinner anytime."

"Thank you," Severus said. Mrs. Evans had always invited him over in summers past, but before now her offers had always sounded halfhearted.

Lily walked him to the door and stepped outside with him.

"I'm surprised, Sev." She pulled the door closed until only a sliver of light fell across her shoe. "That was very sweet of you."

"Well, I—" Severus stopped and shoved his hands into his sleeves. He didn't know what he had intended to say.

"Let's do something tomorrow," Lily said. "Why don't I come by in the morning?"

"Yes!" Severus said, a little too enthusiastically. He lowered his head. "Yeah, that would be great. I have a surprise for you."


	3. Chapter 3: The Dark Lord's Plan

Chapter 3

As Severus strode away from Lily's house, the lush scent of tulips was replaced by the dull, heavy reek of sewage. It was already late, but he had something to do before returning home. As he turned the corner, he quickened his pace and curled his fingers around his wand. Death Eaters usually stayed away from Cokeworth, but Severus had once stumbled across the werewolf Fenrir Greyback hunched by a wall two doors down the row, and since then he had been wary of staying out at night.

An hour later, his mission complete, he hurried home and slunk quietly into the sitting room. Just as he'd hoped, his parents were already asleep. Leaving his trunk by the door, he tiptoed upstairs and fell into bed fully clothed.

Severus had barely finished breakfast when he heard a loud rapping on the door. Lily was waiting on the step, red hair woven in twin braids, hands clasped behind her back.

"Did I wake you up?" she asked. Without waiting for a reply, she said, "What's the surprise? It isn't anything _bad_, is it?"

Severus paused too long before answering, and Lily's smile faded. "It's not evil, I swear. Nothing Dark." Whether it was 'bad' was debatable.

Kicking open his trunk, Severus found his old tan coat, which he shrugged on to hide the garish shirt he'd reluctantly donned this morning. He glanced at Lily, afraid she would laugh, but her eyes were full of sympathy.

"Let's go." Severus jumped down the steps to the street and turned left. "It's this way."

Lily fell into step beside him. "Where are we going? Are we meeting someone? Is this about one of your spells? Is your family moving?" She pretended to pout. "Come on, Sev, you have to say something."

"No, and no, and no. Not even close."

They turned another corner, and Severus could see the alley where he'd hidden the surprise. Now that they were here, he didn't think this was such a good idea after all. This was something Potter and his reckless friends would do.

With the sun hidden behind low clouds, the narrow alley was hardly lighter than it had been last night. Severus paused at the entrance and then took three measured steps forward, his back against the wall. When he drew out his wand and tapped the air before hi, the Disillusionment Charm slid away to reveal a gleaming black motorbike.

"Sev!" Lily's voice was reproachful. "You stole that, didn't you?"

"No, I borrowed it," Severus said quickly. "The owners won't even notice it's missing; I've made sure of that."

"You don't even have a license."

Severus shrugged. "I know how to drive the thing; it's not that hard."

Lily rolled her eyes. "These are _muggle_ streets. You need a muggle license, in case the muggle police decide to stop you and ask what the hell you're doing."

"That's what the Confundus Charm is for," Severus said. "Come on, it won't be that bad. I bet you'll have fun."

Lily bit her lip, clearly torn. Severus gave her a pleading half-smile, surprised that she wasn't putting up more of a fight. Crossing her arms, Lily glanced from Severus to the motorbike and back. Then she sighed.

"Fine. I'll do it." She laughed at Severus's expression. "But if anything goes wrong, I'll kill you."

Grinning, Severus wheeled the motorbike into the street and swung a leg over the seat. Lily climbed on behind him and linked her hands around his waist, pressing her body along his spine. It was a strange feeling, being held, and Severus loved her gentle warmth.

"You're so thin," Lily whispered.

Severus turned the ignition and grasped the handlebars. Lifting one foot from the ground, he pressed the gas.

The bike leapt forward. Lily gasped and tightened her grip on Severus's waist, while he slowed and leaned forward to swerve around the corner. Three narrow streets later, the road widened and the houses began to taper off, replaced by rolling pastures. Severus pressed harder on the gas and sped up; Lily shrieked and then started laughing. They were flying along the highway, past stone walls and grazing sheep and tidy farmhouses. Both of them were laughing now, and as Severus swerved onto a quiet country lane, Lily rested her chin on his shoulder. Their cheeks were almost touching, though a wall of wind rushed between them.

"I've never done this before," Severus shouted over the roar.

"You're telling me now?" Lily yelled back. "You're crazy!" Her arms tightened protectively around Severus.

Ahead, the clouds were beginning to part, and a patch of sunshine gilded the nearby hills. They were nearing the ocean.

"If I became a Death Eater," Severus shouted, "I would learn all of their secrets. Just think—so much knowledge!"

"Don't say that," Lily yelled. "If you mention them one more time, I'm getting off this bike and walking home! And I'll never speak to you again."

Severus nodded grimly and leaned forward. He could smell the salt and brine on the wind, and as they topped the next hill, the ocean came into view ahead. He pressed the bike faster still, adrenaline ripping away his dark thoughts. This was exhilarating.

When the road ended, the pavement lost beneath a mound of sand, Severus pulled to an abrupt stop and nearly fell over. He thrust his foot into a scrubby patch of grass to steady the bike and shook his hair out of his eyes.

"You were right," Lily said in Severus's ear. He turned in surprise and saw her smiling mischievously. "That was fun."

Unhooking her hands from around his waist, she slid off the seat and did a twirl on the sand bank.

"I think I've been here before," Lily said, turning to the gleaming waves. The clouds rolled even farther apart, and suddenly the two of them were bathed in sunlight. "Yes…we had a picnic here, I think. It was warm, so Tuney and I went swimming, but I'm pretty sure this was where she nearly drowned."

Severus laughed, and Lily shook her head at him.

"I'd almost forgotten about that. It's why she's never liked the ocean."

Leaving the motorbike at the end of the road, Severus and Lily stepped over the sandbank and wove their way through the scraggly brush towards the water. When the grass gave way to white sand, they kicked off their shoes and continued barefoot. At the water, Lily knelt to fold up the hems of her pants before wading in. Severus stopped with his toes at the line of foam left by the last wave. Lily's braided hair was molten in the sun, and her cheeks were flushed with joy.

"It's beautiful," Lily said, lifting her face to the sun.

"Yes. Beautiful." Lily was beautiful. He couldn't take his eyes off her radiant face.

Digging her toes into the watery sand, Lily bent to splash her fingers in the receding wave. "Someday I'll live by the sea," she said. "In a little cottage with windows everywhere. I want the whole place to be bright and cheerful."

Severus nodded without quite following her words. "Lily?" he ventured. "Can I try to explain something to you? I don't want you to be afraid of me; I want—"

"I'm not afraid of you." Lily turned and gave Severus a searching look. "I'm afraid of what you might become. You're so smart and powerful and lonely. Just like You-Know-Who."

Severus didn't know what to say to that, so he continued as though she hadn't spoken. "I just want you to know why I think the Dark Lord is so fascinating. If you don't like it, you can pretend we never had this conversation, but just hear me out, okay?"

Lily clasped her hands behind her back. "Fine."

Turning to the horizon, Severus tried to put into words exactly why he was so intrigued by the Dark Arts and everything the Dark Lord was doing.

"The Dark Lord is poised to become one of the most powerful wizards in history. There are rumors that he discovered secrets at Hogwarts that none of the headmasters have ever known. He's gone farther than anyone in his study of the Dark Arts, but he's also uncovered knowledge that we've lost over time. At this rate, he could revolutionize our very understanding of magic."

"Yes, but you can't just ignore all the horrible things he's done," Lily said under her breath.

"Maybe his actions aren't random cruelty," Severus said. "I think he has a plan, something greater than anyone could guess."

Lily crossed her arms; Severus couldn't see her expression, but she was clearly upset. "I don't care about that," she snapped. "That doesn't justify killing innocent people. Most of the people he's gone after are muggles, Sev."

Severus bit his tongue. He had almost said something he would regret. _It's just habit_, he told himself fiercely. _I don't actually think that about muggles_.

"Let me finish," he told Lily. "I don't know what his grand plan is, but I know the Dark Lord is obsessed with immortality. That's not an evil goal, is it? Nicolas Flamel and his wife are highly respected, aren't they?"

"Yes, but—"

"The Dark Lord doesn't want to make a second Philosopher's Stone, but I bet if we could figure out what he _was_ trying to do, we'd know what he really wants to accomplish."

"Really, Sev, I don't want to hear any more about your obsession with—"

"Lily. Please." Severus grabbed her shoulders and forced her to turn and look into his eyes. "I want to believe that he's doing the right thing. Help me find the truth. Help me figure out how he's going to make himself immortal. If it's not something evil, will you give me another chance?"

Lily held Severus's gaze, her green eyes wary. "And if it is evil?"

Severus dropped his hands from her shoulders. "Then I swear I'll never join him. If he's hurting innocent people for his own selfish gain, I'll do everything to help destroy him."

After a long silence, Lily began to nod. "Okay. I'll help you. We'll figure out the truth."

A wave swept up the beach, swirling over Severus's feet and drenching the bottoms of his pants. He jumped—he'd forgotten where they were standing.

Lily's mouth twitched. "Just remember that I'm terrified of You-Know-Who," she said. "I'm only doing this because I don't want to lose you."


	4. Chapter 4: The London Library

Chapter 4

On the ride back to Cokeworth, Lily said, "So, how _did_ you get this bike? The Ministry would know if you'd used magic, right?"

"No, actually," Severus said loudly. "I think they can only track spells in nonmagical households. Last summer I got in a fight and hexed my dad, and no one knew anything about it. Of course, he was all for turning me in to the Ministry himself—he hates when Mum and I use magic."

"Oh," Lily said. "So you Confunded whoever you took this from, then?"

"It was a car dealership," Severus said. "Yeah, I did. They'll be surprised when it turns up again, so I'll have to wipe their memories too."

"You'd be arrested for this if you were a muggle," Lilly yelled, though she sounded amused.

"I'd make an awful muggle."

Severus drove Lily to her front porch, risking a confrontation with her family to drop her off at home; luckily no one was in sight.

"We should start with the London Library," Severus said as Lily climbed off the motorbike. "I asked Slughorn for help with a potion I was trying to improve, and he didn't know what advice to give me, but he told me about the wizards' wing of the library."

"We have a secret library?" Lily's eyes lit up.

"Well, part of one," Severus said offhandedly. He was just as eager to get his hands on the books as Lily, but he didn't want to mention the reason—the London Library was bound to have volumes on Dark magic that had been removed even from Hogwarts' restricted section. "I think there are wizards' wings hidden all throughout the country, but the Ministry is supposed to grant access to anyone who wants to study there."

"And why are we allowed in?"

Severus grinned. "Slughorn gave me express permission. And he's _very_ well connected."

Lily's smile grew as she stepped back from the curb. "Let's go tomorrow.

Severus nodded and revved the motorbike. "See you."

"Thanks for the ride," Lily called, waving after him as he drove away.

When Severus returned home, he found his mum on her knees in the dining room, scrubbing grime from the floor without magic.

"What are you doing?" he asked sharply, afraid for her sanity.

His mum smiled wanly at him. "That neighbor girl—Lily, right? She must be a very sweet thing, and her mother too."

Severus's frown deepened. "Yes, of course. I'll be going to the London Library with her tomorrow, in fact." He stepped forward and flicked on the lights. "Are you all right, Mum?"

"Yes, yes. Certainly. How would you like to invite Lily over for dinner sometime this week?" She plucked a doxy dropping off the seat cushion and dropped it in the wastebasket."

"Why?" Severus asked, wrinkling his nose. "I'd be embarrassed to have her see this place."

That was exactly the wrong thing to say. His mum sniffed loudly, her pale eyes filling with tears. Slamming the filthy rag into the wastebasket, she hurried out of the dining room.

"Mum, I'm sorry, I didn't mean that!" Severus called, but it was too late. He cursed loudly and kicked the nearest chair.

As he began unpacking his school things, though, he began to think that having Lily over for dinner might not be such a bad idea. They couldn't very well leave volumes of Dark magic lying around at Lily's house, especially with Petunia's tendency to snoop, so Lily and Severus would have to do their investigation here. Severus had been too ashamed to let Lily inside before now, but a little dinner party would be the perfect excuse to get the place tidied up until it looked fit for human habitation.

Severus threw the last of his socks and spare parchment into the large chest at the foot of his bed, slammed the lid, and bounded downstairs.

"Mum?" he called. "Mum, where are you?"

Eventually he found her in the pantry, sweeping what looked like charred sheets of paper into a pile.

"I've changed my mind," Severus said. "We should have Lily over for dinner; it's a brilliant idea. What—what is that?"

His mum's hands shook slightly on the broom handle. "Just—just a few old books. Old notes. Noting—nothing important." She turned quickly away.

Severus clenched a fist around his wand. "Dad burned your potions notes, didn't he?"

Blood was pounding in his ears; he was ready to curse his dad.

"Why—don't—you—let—me—_deal—_with—him?" Severus spat out each word, wand growing hot in his grip.

"No!" His mum got shakily to her feet. "Let's tidy this place up a bit, shall we?" She steered Severus out of the pantry. "I don't want you to be embarrassed when Lily shows up. Don't worry, don't worry."

She was still looking carefully at the ground, but her hands no longer shook.

"Here, we can start with the kitchen," she said, pressing a sodden rag into his hands.

They spent the rest of the afternoon scrubbing every centimeter of the kitchen until it gleamed. Severus hated cleaning without magic, but he swallowed his pride and threw himself into the work. Though he and his mum barely spoke, there was a certain companionship in the silence.

"Well, this looks nice," his mum said at last, dropping her broom by the door and standing back to survey the kitchen.

"Yeah." Severus smiled at her. "I don't think I've ever seen this place so clean."

His mum made a face. "Go tell Lily she's invited for dinner. This Thursday, say."

Severus hurried down the street to Lily's house, where he lifted a hand to knock and realized that he hadn't washed away any of the filth. When the door opened, he hid his hands behind his back.

"What're you doing here?" It was Petunia.

"I wanted to ask Lily something," Severus said, feigning politeness.

"You were with her all morning," Petunia said scathingly. "Couldn't you have asked her then?"

Severus dropped his fake smile and glared at her. After a moment she tossed her head scornfully and stepped out of the way. "She's in the kitchen."

Lily was rolling out chocolate-chip cookies when Severus found her.

"Hey!" she said brightly. "You want to stay for dinner?"

Severus shook his head. "Not tonight. Actually, my mum was wondering if you wanted to come over for dinner on Thursday."

"Ooh, I'd love to," Lily said. "Does this mean I'll finally get to see the rest of your house?" She pulled open the oven and slid in the tray of cookie dough.

"I guess."

"Want some dough?" Lily asked, grinning.

Severus held up his filthy hands. "Sorry, I can't."

Lily tore off a chunk of dough with plenty of chocolate chips. "Here. Open up." She fed Severus the dough, still looking smug.

Mouth full, Severus could only smile and wave as he turned to leave.

The next morning Severus woke to a sharp rapping at his door.

"What?" he called, disgruntled. It was so early that he couldn't see any light through his tiny window.

His mum came cautiously into his room. "Lily's at the door. She says her mother will drop you two off on her way to work, if you can get ready quickly enough."

"Damn her," Severus muttered, throwing off his covers. "What are you doing up so early?" he asked in a louder voice.

"I always rise early, dear," his mum said absently.

Ten minutes later, Severus ran to the front door with his coat in one hand and his wand in the other.

"Sorry," he panted when he saw Lily waiting beside her family's silver car. He stuffed his wand in one pocket and thrust an arm through his coat.

"No, I should've told you we were going this early." Lily grinned impishly. "I'm so excited!"

Mrs. Evans handed Severus a paper sack. "I've packed a bit of breakfast for both of you."

Inside, Severus found a muffin with jam and a large green apple. Once he'd finished eating he fell asleep with his cheek smashed against the window; when he woke, they were in London and the sun had risen properly.

"Here we are—the London Library," Mrs. Evans said. She pulled to a stop in front of a tall, gray stone building with carved flourishes around the windows and pillars lining the front entrance. "I'll meet you here at three-thirty sharp. I have Lily a bit of money for lunch, so you can treat yourselves when you've finished looking at books."

"Thanks, Mum!" Lily kissed her mother on the cheek and jumped out of the car. Severus hunched his shoulders as he stood, wishing he owned less conspicuous muggle clothes.

"Okay, so where is this wizards' wing?" Lily asked brightly.

"No idea," Severus said. "I've never been here before, so we'll just have to follow Slughorn's directions."

"Which are…?"

Severus led the way up the broad steps and through the tall front doors. "We're supposed to take these stairs to the right, and then keep climbing until we reach a dead end."

"Right," Lily said skeptically. She bounded up the stairs and then slowed, leaning out over the rail.

"Wow. Look, Sev."

Below them was an enormous room filled with shelves and tables and thousands upon thousands of books. The space was lit by two dangling chandeliers, and smaller lamps cast pools of light on the tables.

"Impressive," Severus said. "But we can look around later, once we've found our books."

They followed another stairway up to a second balcony running around the main space; and another to a musty, cramped floor of old records and files.

"I don't see another staircase," Lily said.

"It has to be somewhere." Severus turned sideways and edged along a narrow row of scrolls and boxes. The room opened up somewhat when they neared the center, and Severus thought he could see a flight of stairs pressed up against the far wall.

"This way," he said, rounding his shoulders so he didn't have to walk sideways.

He had been right—at the end of the aisle sat a staircase that climbed right up to the ceiling and ended abruptly.

"This has to be it," he said with growing excitement. Even if they learned nothing, it would be worth the trip to London just to see this secret wing. He began to climb the stairs, his footsteps muffled in a layer of dust.

At the top he pressed a hand to the ceiling, just to be sure, but it was solid and unyielding. Glancing over his shoulder, he drew out his wand and tapped the stone ceiling three times.

"Is something supposed to happen now?" Lily whispered.

Severus frowned at the stairs in front of him. "I thought so. Maybe…" Again he lifted his fingers to the ceiling, and instead of stopping on the cool stone, his hand passed right through. "Aha! It's open."

Tucking away his wand, Severus put a hand on the wall and climbed two more stairs. He didn't feel anything as his head passed through the ceiling, but the lights suddenly blinked out. He continued to climb, groping his way through the darkness, until he reached a flat platform.

"Sev?" Lily's voice was sharp in the dead space.

"Here," he said. "Careful, the stairs go down after you reach the top."

Extending his hand forward, Severus took five blind steps down. Then the darkness lifted, and he stood blinking in the light from a magnificent room.


	5. Chapter 5: The Wizards' Wing

Chapter 5

Severus was so awestruck at the sight of the Wizards' Wing that he forgot to move out of the way; Lily walked right into him and nearly sent both of them toppling down the stairs.

"Oof—sorry!" Lily yelped.

Severus grabbed her shoulders and set her upright. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm—_wow_."

The staircase they stood on was a wide, polished marble spiral, with white steps and a gleaming gold handrail. The floor far below was filled by a giant round table, and the walls were lined with bookshelves two stories high. It looked more like a palace ballroom than a library, and the table ringed with thronelike chairs could well have been Merlin's Round Table.

"Imagine if Hogwarts had a library like this," Lily whispered.

Hushed and wide-eyed, Lily and Severus began making their way slowly down the grand staircase. As they descended, Severus caught the scent of vanilla, a pleasantly musty smell that threaded through the covers of the old books and hung over the room like the taste of knowledge.

At the foot of the stairs, they reached the desk of an irascible-looking wizard in midnight-blue robes. Behind him several wizards and witches browsed the shelves, some high on the sliding ladders. All of them wore robes. Severus ducked his chin, more conscious of his oversize muggle clothes than ever.

"Names?" the wizard at the desk asked shortly.

"Severus Snape and Lily Evans," Severus said.

"You're not in the records," the wizard said, flipping through a massive tome, "and I haven't seen you before. You need permission to access the Wizards' Wing, you know."

"We're students at Hogwarts," Severus said quickly. "Professor Slughorn said we should be allowed in to research something for his class. He told me to ask for Vlad Gardino, and tell him that he'd found a few old books on goblin mythology that might interest him."

"Did he, now?" The wizard's face lit up. "I am Vlad, of course. I'll have to send old Slughorn an owl right away." He slammed the book of names shut. "Go on, browse away. It'll be twenty books out at a time, and I'll give you the details of return when you're ready to leave."

"Thank you so much," Lily said, beaming. She nudged Severus, and they skirted around the security desk to stand beside the round table.

"It's alphabetical by subject, I think," Lily said in a hushed voice. "Here's aconite… acromantulas…Agrippa…alchemy…animagi…arithmancy…ashwinders…asphodel…"

"Well, let's start by seeing if they have a section on immortality," Severus said. "It can't hurt to look."

Lily nodded and followed Severus along the left wall of the room. They skirted past a witch who was yanking dozens of volumes from a shelf entirely devoted to dragons, and a pair of sliding ladders covering the G and H shelves.

"Here," Severus said. "Instant cooking…ink, magical…Inferi…the Imperius curse…immortality. Hah!"

Lily shoved one of the three-story-tall sliding ladders towards Severus. "Good think we're not afraid of heights. Come on."

She dropped her bag and began to climb the ladder. After a moment Severus followed, cringing each time the ladder shook.

Two stories above the library floor, Lily slowed and leaned out to grab a book.

"Here we are," she said. "There are only two shelves, though. I thought there'd be more."

"We'd probably find more under Dark Arts," Severus said grimly. "Hand me a few of those books, and I'll bring them down. You can sort through the rest of these, and I'll see what I can find in Dark Arts."

Lily nodded and leaned precariously over the ladder's edge. "Here," she said, crouching to hand Severus three books.

He climbed two rungs higher and put a hand on the back of her knees, afraid she would fall.

"Take this one, too. And these. And—oof!"

Her hand slipped, and a book went toppling off the shelf. Severus whipped out his wand and muttered a quick "Accio," and the book zoomed back to his hand before it hit the floor.

"Sorry," Lily said, giggling. "Careful the security wizard doesn't see you."

When Severus's arms were overloaded with books, he climbed awkwardly down the ladder and dropped them in a pile on the table. Then he made his way to the D shelf.

The books on Dark magic were shelved at the very top, as though someone wanted to keep them superficially out of reach, and they filled six dusty rows. Most of the volumes had no visible titles, so Severus grabbed the nearest handful. A gold book with a jewel-encrusted spine caught his eye, so he added it to the stack before making his way carefully down the ladder. Lily was still fetching the books on immortality; before rejoining her, Severus flipped open the first two books in his arms, looking for titles. The first was _Mysteries of the Forgotten Arts_, the other _Dark Magic Demystified_. Severus piled them alongside the other books, grinning to himself.

"Here," Lily said, dropping a haphazard armload of books. "These are the last."

Severus and Lily drew two of the high-backed chairs together and spent the rest of the morning sorting through books. Severus left the Dark Arts books for later, pretending they were a mere afterthought.

A few of the books were written in such antiquated English that Severus tossed them aside without attempting to read them, and the majority were purely theoretical studies, some by muggles, that predated the creation of the Elixir of Life. Eventually they were left with twelve books that seemed promising, and Severus was able to check out all seven of the Dark Arts books.

"I'll look through these later," he said, getting to his feet.

Lily nodded, wrinkling her nose. "I'm starving. Let's go find lunch."

The security wizard gave Severus a suspicious frown when he noticed the jewel-encrusted spine, but he said nothing about it.

"These books will be due back in three weeks. They're to be returned in person, not by owl. Don't even think about stealing them—they have a rather nasty curse on them, and if you keep them past three weeks, you'll have to make a trip to St. Mungo's to get it removed. At which point you'll be handing over a hefty overdue fine."

"Thank you," Lily said, tucking the books into her bag. "We won't forget."

Back on the step of the London Library, Severus and Lily stood blinking in the afternoon sun. The streets were thronged with honking cars and yelling people, and immediately Severus wished he was somewhere else.

"Look, there's a little café over there," Lily said, shading her eyes with a hand. "Let's see what they have."

Severus nodded in relief and followed her through the crowd. She grabbed his arm before cutting across the street, and he hurried to keep up.

They bought sandwiches at the café and took them out to the little table just in front, where they sat enjoying the sun and commenting on passers-by. When she finished her sandwich, Lily closed her eyes and tilted her head back, hair shining in the sun. Severus forgot his lunch and just stared hungrily at her. It seemed impossible that she could ever be his, but he wanted her more than anything.

Eventually Lily opened her eyes and said, "Just out of curiosity, what's in that huge jeweled book?"

Severus grabbed his sandwich and turned his gaze hurriedly to the street. "No idea. It just looked pretty."

Lily glared at him. "You didn't even look through these Dark Arts books, did you? You have no idea if they're even slightly related to immortality."

Pulling the gilded book from her bag, Lily threw it onto the table.

"If you're just using this as an excuse to further whatever awful plans you have, I'll—"

"What?" Severus said bitterly. "You'll never talk to me again? You'll set Potter and his friends on me?"

"Oh!" Lily said, exasperated. "You know I wouldn't do that. But Sev—"

"Lily, I don't have any 'awful plans.' I'm just curious, and I think this stuff might be helpful." Severus eased the jeweled book out of Lily's grip. "I honestly did just think this was pretty. I'll bet you it's just a pureblood genealogy."

Biting her lip, Lily reached over and pulled back the book's cover. Just as Severus had guessed, the page it fell open to was an elaborate family tree.

"Fine," Lily said, "you win." Her playful voice had returned, and Severus let out a nervous breath. "But we should concentrate on something that's actually useful. Here, look—_Forty-Seven Directives for an Elixir to Prolong Life_. You can start there."

Grinning, Severus took the book from Lily. Everything was going to be all right.


	6. Chapter 6: Tobias Snape

Chapter 6

When Severus got home that evening, he stacked the books under his bed and didn't touch them for the next two days. He had to get his house ready for Lily to come for dinner.

"I hope you'll help with the cooking, too," his mum said briskly. The prospect of having a visitor had cheered her up considerably.

Severus made a face. "I've never cooked anything in my life, Mum. I'll make an awful mess."

"Nonsense." His mum handed him a rag and a can of doxy spray. "It's exactly like mixing potions, and I know you're brilliant at that."

Severus flushed at the unexpected praise. "Well, there's no rule saying potions have to taste good." He sighed. "But I'll try."

Once the sitting room curtains were doxy-free, Severus heaved open the grime-coated windows to let in a bit of light and sultry air. The dust and cobwebs and liquor stains looked much worse in the light; Severus threw himself into cleaning with renewed vigor. He would have to sweep up his bedroom too, he supposed, but it was nowhere near as neglected as the rest of the house.

By Thursday morning, the kitchen, dining room, and sitting room were spotless (though nothing could hide the threadbare rugs and tattered furniture), while the rest of the house looked worse than ever. The bathroom, the pantry, and both bedrooms were stacked with disused clutter they had unearthed in cleaning—old muggle lamps and radios that had deteriorated too quickly from overexposure to magic; torn parchment that had never made it to the rubbish bin; and a surprising number of magical artifacts that Severus's mum had clearly hoped to conceal from her husband. Among these were a sneakoscope, a set of solid gold scales, and—Severus was taken aback when he found it—a shriveled Hand of Glory.

"Mum, have you been…sneaking around anywhere lately?" Severus asked.

The color drained from her cheeks. "Has your father been making wild accusations again?"

"No. Never mind." His lip curling, Severus shoved the Hand of Glory into the far back of a drawer and shut it with a snap.

They spent the afternoon baking bread and berry tart and a casserole made from an assortment of odd, lumpy root vegetables they'd unearthed in the cellar. Severus was just bending over to check the tart when Lily knocked.

"Oh, here she is!" his mum said, patting nervously at her stringy hair. "I'll get the tart. Go let her in."

Lily was wearing a green summer dress that brought out her eyes, and she smiled sweetly at Severus when he beckoned her inside.

"Wow, your house looks amazing," she said, turning in a circle and surveying the sitting room.

That was a bit of an exaggeration, Severus thought—the furniture still sagged, and nothing could hide the dark stains on the walls—but it was remarkable how much difference a bit of scrubbing and a few extra lights could make.

"Don't come in yet," Severus's mum called, sounded flustered.

"Want to see my room?" Severus asked.

"Yes!"

He led Lily up the creaking staircase to his small bedroom, with its slanted ceiling and single tiny window. The library books were still piled under the foot of his bed, which was the only piece of furniture he owned apart from a chest of drawers.

"You don't have much, do you?" Lily said. "I bet you're happy to go back to Hogwarts, where at least your bedroom doesn't look like a prison cell."

"Yeah," Severus muttered. "But that's not the only reason I like getting out of here."

Lily smiled sadly. "Well, let's go see if dinner is ready. I'm starving."

As they made their way downstairs, Severus caught the scent of tomatoes and fresh basil mingling with the savory casserole. The table was set, so he and Lily took their seats as his mum poured pumpkin juice.

"Help yourselves," she said, handing Lily the steaming basket of bread.

"Thanks, Mum," Severus said. "This looks wonderful."

She gave him a suspicious look, as though afraid he was mocking her, but after a moment she smiled.

"Did you bake this?" Lily asked. "It's delicious."

Severus handed her a pot of honey. "I did the bread," he said smugly. "It was my first time baking anything, actually."

Lily giggled. "So, Mrs. Snape, what do you do?"

"It's Eileen, please," she said. "I write a potions advice column for the Daily Prophet—dealing with nasty side-effects and strange conditions and the like—and I'm one of the Potions Board consultants at St. Mungo's."

"Wow," Lily said. "That sounds amazing."

Severus's mum laughed nervously. "No, it's actually quite boring. Back when I was in school, I thought I would join the Ministry's Foreign Substance Research Division and travel the world looking for new potion ingredients."

"You never told me that!" Severus said.

His mum shrugged and passed the casserole to Lily.

"Thanks. Why didn't you join the Ministry, then?"

"Well, I had a kid and got married, so I figured I should settle down."

Severus lowered his eyes guiltily. It was his fault, then, that his mum had ended up like this.

"I would never marry someone who wouldn't let me do what I wanted," Lily said. Frowning, she took a bit of the casserole, which was lumpy and grayish beneath an oozing layer of cheese. Her eyes widened. "This is good! Wow, that's delicious. What's in it?"

Severus and his mum shared a look and started laughing.

"I'm pretty sure there isn't any mandrake root in there," Severus said, "but anything else is fair game."

Lily giggled. "Could I have a bit more?"

Severus took a bit of the soft bread, which melted with the honey in his mouth. "What are you planning to do after school?" he asked. "I know you once said you'd be a dragon tamer," he teased, "but you were—"

"Eight, I think," Lily said, shaking her head. "I didn't realize there were real jobs in our world." Her smile faded and she examined her plate very carefully. "I've been thinking that it would be fun to be an Auror."

When Lily caught Severus's eye and raised an eyebrow, he could guess her unspoken thought. _Imagine what it would look like if we were together—an Auror and a Death Eater_.

"I think that'd be wonderful," Severus said, trying not to sound sarcastic. "Just—don't get yourself killed. It's not the safest profession."

Lily rolled her eyes. "I could say the same to you, but you wouldn't—"

She broke off, looking back towards the sitting room. Someone was stomping up their front steps, and a second later the door was yanked open with a whining protest of hinges.

"Oh, dear. Oh, dear." Severus's mum threw her napkin on the table and jumped to her feet, upsetting her glass of pumpkin juice. "He was supposed to be working late; I don't understand why—"

"Evening, Honey," Severus's father called from the sitting room. He sounded happier than usual. "I have a surprise for you."

There followed two loud clunks as he dropped his umbrella and briefcase by the door, and then his footsteps came closer. Severus looked down at Lily—without realizing it, he'd also gotten to his feet—and wondered if he could hide her in the pantry before his father saw her.

"I have a meeting in Paris, Eileen. And you'll be coming!"

He rounded the corner and took his wife's hands. Tall and angular and dark-haired, he wore the usual mocking sneer that left his face only when he shouted. He would have made an excellent pure-blood, Severus thought sourly.

"We'll take the train in three days, so—"

He caught sight of Lily, and his nostrils flared. "Who is _this_?"

Severus's mum gasped; his father was still gripping her hands, and his fingers had tightened to claws.

"Just—just a friend," she said hurriedly, eyes darting around the room. "A neighbor. We were just trying to—to be friendly."

"She's a _witch_, isn't she?" his father spat. "From that awful school." He threw his wife's hands away from him and she backed against the table, heedless of the spilled pumpkin juice now staining her skirt.

"You _swore_ when I married you that there would be _nothing wrong_ with our children! But he's as foul as you, and now you're turning this place into a breeding ground for _scum_. LOOK AT ME!" he roared. He grabbed her chin and forced her to turn her head.

Head pounding with shame and anger, Severus pulled Lily from her seat and dragged her out of the dining room.

"You should get out of here," he muttered, unable to meet her eyes. "I'm sorry. This was a horrible idea. My family's all messed up; you don't have to come see me again. I understand if you—"

"I NEVER WANT TO SEE THAT GIRL AGAIN!" Severus's father shouted from the other room.

Lily reached for Severus's hand. "Don't blame yourself for what they're like," she whispered. "Of course I—"

As his father began shouting again, Severus pushed Lily gently to the door. "Go. Get out of here."

Lily nodded. "Tell your mum that everything was fantastic."

The moment Lily pulled the door shut, Severus turned on his heel and stomped up to his room. He slammed the door and threw himself onto his bed, wishing Potter was around to fling curses at. His father's shouting continued to echo up the stairwell for a long time.


	7. Chapter 7: The Dark Arts

Chapter 7

Severus spent the next week avoiding Lily. He had hoped initially that she would seek him out and beg him to stop hiding, but when that didn't happen, he decided he didn't want to see her after all. So he wandered the streets of Cokeworth when most of the residents were off at work or summer school, sometimes making it as far as the sun-beaten country lanes beyond the suburbs. At night he locked himself in his room and began to devour the books on the Dark Arts.

The first book to catch his eye was a well-worn leather volume titled _Justifying the Forbidden: An Argument for Furthering the Study of Dark Arts_. It was written by Cormander Slavski, a former headmaster of Durmstrang; Severus assumed it had been published during the incorporation of Dark magic into the school's curriculum.

Slavski argued that the separation of magic into Dark and Light was fundamentally problematic, and that it might be more accurate to classify magic as internal and external. "Light" magic was produced by external sources, such as the magical ingredients of potions and the wand-gesture-word combinations known as spells. "Dark" magic, on the other hand, required a sacrifice—power, blood, strength—or a fiercely destructive emotion. Slavski also spoke briefly of heart-hardening, soul-splitting, and mind-clouding, but Severus dismissed these sections as romantic foolishness.

He was fascinated by it all. The more Severus read, the more transfixed he was by the infinite possibilities that Dark magic offered to wizardkind. It was such a vast, untouched field; there could be whole worlds out there, waiting to be discovered by the first wizard bold enough to reach.

As the last daylight faded from his tiny window, Severus lay back on his bed with the book flattened across his stomach, smiling at the shadowed angle of the roof. "The Half-Blood Prince" was a title he'd half-jokingly made up for himself a few years back, when he'd first learned that the Dark Lord had a muggle father, and for now the title existed only in his potions book. He'd wanted to associate it with all the improvements he'd scribbled in the margins. But he could imagine people hailing him as the Dark Prince—cloaked in mystery, he delved deep into the tangled web of Dark magic, surfacing only to share his earth-shattering discoveries with the admiring Ministry. He was feared and adored, and only beautiful, brave Lily Evans dared to walk beside him—

"Severus!" his mum called up the stairs.

Feeling a bit foolish, Severus shoved Slavski's book under his blankets and slouched down to join his mum for dinner.

"What have you been doing?" his mum asked, flustered and pink-cheeked. "I've been trying to call you for the past five minutes. Your father will be home for dinner, so we have to make sure the table is laid out."

"Sorry," Severus muttered. "I was just reading. What's Father coming home early for?"

His mum shrugged and tugged at a stringy lock of her hair.

A minute later his father clomped up the steps and wrenched open the door. Severus and his mum both jumped, and they laughed guiltily.

"Bloody owls!" his father shouted. "Severus, some idiot sent you a letter."

He threw down his briefcase with a thud and stalked to the kitchen, where Severus and his mum busied themselves with dishing up stew.

"After how much energy you witches put into your silly little magic tricks, you should've come up with a better way to deliver mail by now. Something _less conspicuous_." He slapped the envelope into Severus's hand. "If I wanted those blasted animals everywhere, I would've married a zookeeper."

When Severus was much younger, his mum had been forced to cancel their _Daily Prophet_ subscription after a particularly nasty row they'd had about the owls swooping in every morning.

"So, Tobias," Severus's mum said timidly, "why did you get to leave early again? It would be so nice if you were home before dinner a bit more often."

_No, it wouldn't_, Severus thought furiously. He took a seat and pried the seal from the envelope. It was the Black family crest, not that he had to look to know. None of Severus's other friends were pretentious enough to seal their letters with wax.

"Boss is trying to hire a few new faces," his father said, shaking open the muggle newspaper and hiding his face behind a large photo of the Prime Minister shaking hands with the American president. "He's been interviewing and training the blokes after hours, so we can't stay around to finish up business."

Severus's father worked at the local bank, and liked to speak of his dull bookkeeping job as though it was a lot more powerful and well-paying than it actually was. When Severus had visited Diagon Alley for the first time, he had been quick to tell his father that his job belonged to goblins in the wizarding world. His father had hit him.

Since no one was paying him any attention, Severus pushed aside his stew and unfolded the letter from Bellatrix. She was overly fond of sending letters to her friends, and especially of sharing slightly different sets of information with each of them. She loved creating uncomfortable social situations and stirring up quarrels. Frowning, he read,

_My dear Severus, _

_It has been dreadfully tiresome to spend these weeks at home alone, with only the silly house-elf for company_ (of course she wasn't alone, Severus thought; she had her parents and sister and sometimes even her cousins for company). _If I must be deprived of the sight of your ridiculous face for much longer, I may have to start stunning muggle children again. I know you love their expressions as they crumple over backwards. _

_Anyhow, everyone who matters will be meeting at the Leaky Cauldron on Saturday next, for a little jaunt into Knockturn Alley. Nine o'clock sharp. Don't pretend you will be too busy snogging the Mudblood to show up. I _will _come find you, and perhaps have a bit of fun with your muggle father._

_Yours truly,_

_Bellatrix_

More than a little annoyed, Severus creased the letter in half again and stuffed it back into the envelope. He hated that Bellatrix knew how much he wanted Lily, and he dreaded having to justify a trip to Knockturn Alley to Lily. Then he remembered that Lily was avoiding him, and his mood darkened further. He reached mechanically for his spoon and finished the stew in a stony silence.

For two days after receiving Bellatrix's letter, Severus sat in his room and devoured the second book in his stack so hungrily that he forgot to eat.

This author was an unnamed young man who had been expelled from Hogwarts, and the book read like a journal of his dangerous exploits into the uncharted universe of Dark magic. The pages were filled with exhilarating discoveries and brutal descriptions of murder and self-mutilation, and Severus was equally fascinated and revolted by the author.

It was past midnight when Severus neared the end of the narrative. The author was describing his search for doorways like the ones created by Pensieves, and by a strange archway residing in the Ministry's Department of Mysteries—passages leading into realms of shadow and memory and death. On the final page, he spoke of using his own blood to stretch open a portal in the ground:

_The grass yawned and vanished, and I was left staring at a square of beautiful, seductive darkness. I crouched and tried to peer past the crusty earth, but it was like a vacuum, and no light escaped. Growing bold, I cast aside my wand and lowered two fingers into the darkness. The air beneath the grass was cold and very dry, though I felt a breeze swirling just past my fingertips. When I tried to reach deeper, the hole closed up quicker than a wink, and I nearly lost my fingers. It needs more blood, I suppose. My own will have to suffice. Tomorrow I will pass through. _

The book ended there.

Severus drew his knees to his chest and huddled against his bed-frame, nerves humming with excitement. Had the man taken so much of his own blood that he'd died, or had he actually passed…through?

It was three-thirty in the morning, but Severus had never felt so awake. He jumped from his bed and began pacing his room. _The Half-Blood Prince, fearlessly traveling between worlds, has discovered treasures more powerful than any that exist on earth_.

The first light of dawn was turning the nearby roofs hazy by the time Severus collapsed into bed, his mind still spinning. When he finally slept, he dreamed of undulating black curtains dotted with stars. The tiny lights flickered in and out of sight, taunting him.


	8. Chapter 8: Lily and the Loch

Thank you very much to everyone who has left reviews! This will be my last update until December—I will be doing National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) all November, so I won't have time until that's over to continue this.

Chapter 8

Severus's mum rapped on his door just before noon, startling him out of his jumbled dreams. A square of light from the window fell on the corner of his bed, and someone outside was revving a car.

"Go away," Severus mumbled as his mum knocked again.

Instead, his mum unlocked the door with a spell and opened it a crack. "Are you feeling all right?" she asked, peering into the room.

"Of course," Severus snapped, though his head ached.

"Well, Lily wanted to see you. She's waiting downstairs."

Severus groaned and swung his feet off the bed. The book was lying on the floor, still open to the last haunting page. "Tell her to go away. I don't want to see her."

"Oh, but I gave her a biscuit and a bit of tea, and—"

"Fine!" Severus yelled. "I'm coming! Now get out of my room!"

When he stomped down to the kitchen, still bleary and rumpled from sleep, Lily met him with a smile that quickly turned into a curious frown.

"What have you been doing with yourself?" she asked.

Even annoyed as he was, Severus loved seeing Lily's face again. She looked suntanned and happy. "Nothing," he said. "What are you doing here?"

Lily's eyes widened. "I missed you! I just got back—we were staying in Dublin, with my mum's sister."

"Oh." Severus was taken aback. "I thought you didn't want to see me again, after—well, after that awful dinner. I shouldn't have agreed to it; I was such an idiot."

"Sev," Lily said, leaning forward and waiting until he met her eyes, "I don't care about that. It was lovely of your mum to invite me, and you must've done a lot of work baking that wonderful bread. Don't be ashamed. None of what happened was your fault."

Severus felt a strange warmth flowing back into him. Lily still cared for him; everything was better now. The obsessive dark weight of the book had lifted somewhat.

"Here, help me eat this biscuit," Lily said, sliding the plate towards him. "You look like you haven't eaten anything in days."

"Yeah," Severus said under his breath, "because I was just asleep. _Someone _came barging in and woke me up."

Lily laughed, and Severus crammed the rest of her biscuit into his mouth. He was starving.

"Anyway," Lily said, "my family is going camping this weekend, up a ways north, and I want you to come."

Severus choked on the biscuit. "What? Seriously?" He coughed and took a sip of the tea that Lily offered. "I've never been camping. I'd love to go."

Lily grinned. "I can't wait! We'll probably leave tomorrow afternoon, so you can come over in the morning and help us pack. I don't think we have a big tent—and definitely not anything like those magical tents James likes to boast about—but there should be enough pup tents to go around."

Severus made a face at Potter's name, but didn't comment.

When Lily had finished her tea and gone home, Severus fetched one of the books on immortality, grabbing the first spine that met his fingers under the bed. He needed to prove that he'd made some progress, since he wasn't about to tell Lily what he'd really been doing the whole time she was away. He returned downstairs and settled into a kitchen chair to read, munching his way through half a loaf of stale bread.

Though he woke early the next morning, Severus waited until noon to join Lily. He didn't want to appear too eager. He hadn't made much headway on the book about immortality; he had been distracted by giddy hopes and foolish, unrealistic daydreams. Maybe Lily's parents were muggles, but this was a chance for Severus to see what a real family was like, the sort that people actually looked forward to seeing over the holidays. He envied Lucius, three years older than him and infinitely more admirable, for the pride he had in his family name.

And, of course, he would be with Lily.

Lily answered the door as soon as he knocked, and she pressed a plate of sandwiches into his hands.

"Here. Eat. I'm almost done packing our food."

Severus followed her to the kitchen, where the counter was piled with bags of rice and noodles and pecans. Mrs. Evans greeted him warmly and poured him a glass of water.

"No, don't help, just eat," she said when Severus tried to join her by the dried food.

By three o'clock, everything was crammed into the small trunk of the car, the leftovers stuffed under seats. Mr. Evans returned from work just then, so all five of them piled into the car. Lily was squashed between Petunia and Severus, who had a hard time resisting the urge to reach for her hand where it lay just inches from his.

"Are we going all the way up to Scotland?" Severus whispered as they passed the crumbling factory and left Cokeworth behind.

"I think so," Lily whispered back. "We're camping near a loch that my aunt told us about. Hey!" This last was directed at Petunia, who had elbowed her sharply.

"Why did we have to drag that stupid Snape boy along?" she hissed, loud enough for Severus to hear.

For once, Severus didn't want to pick a fight with Petunia. As Lily turned to make an angry retort, Severus rolled down his window and let the hot summer wind drown her voice in a roar. His leg was pressed against Lily's, and he could feel every inch of her warm skin through his jeans.

As they continued north, the country around them grew wilder and hillier, until they were passing between the shoulders of two smooth green mountains. The road curved abruptly right and ended at the shore of a still, black loch.

"Here we are," Mr. Evans said. "Our own private beach."

"It's just as beautiful as I remembered," Mrs. Evans said.

A small stretch of sand began where the road ended, but most of the shore was lined with flat black stones. The hills sloped steeply away from the loch, stretching towards boggy mountain peaks dusted with heather. It was very isolated and peaceful, a still valley tucked away from the world.

Mr. Evans and Petunia began to hunt driftwood for a fire, while Severus, Lily, and Mrs. Evans struggled to erect the three tents. Severus dumped his tent out of the narrow bag and stared in frustration at the tangled heap of canvas and metal rods. He kicked the canvas until it unrolled, and tugged it left a few times, but he still couldn't make sense of it. Just as he began fingering his wand, tempted to assemble the mess by magic, Lily took pity on him and came to help.

"Bloody muggles," he said under his breath. "Why does everything have to be so complicated?"

Lily laughed. "It's not that hard, really."

At last the three tents were staked down in the sand and a small campfire was crackling merrily at the water's edge. Mrs. Evans cooked noodles in a charred pot nestled in the coals, while the others roasted sausages and apples on metals skewers. When the noodles were ready, Lily took her bowl down to a cluster of rocks at the water's edge. After a moment's hesitation, Severus joined her.

"So, have you learned anything yet?" Lily asked in a low voice as Severus planted his cup in the sand. "About immortality, I mean."

"Yeah," he said, stirring his noodles, "but nothing useful." He wished he'd at least glanced at the other books, instead of devoting his evening to the dry theoretical tome he'd plowed through.

Lily didn't say anything, though she continued to watch him expectantly.

"Really, I didn't learn anything," Severus said, hunching his shoulders. 'A lot of what I read was written before Flamel, and for a few centuries wizards were fixated on the Elixir of Life. They weren't exploring any other ideas."

"Hmm," Lily said. "Do you think You-Know-Who came up with a completely new set of magic, then? Or is he going back farther than medieval magic?"

Severus sighed. He didn't want to scare Lily, but he was desperate to share what he'd really learned. "I—well, I'm starting to think he must've used Dark magic. It has a lot fewer rules than the regular sort."

"Fantastic." Lily groaned.

Night fell around them, whisking away the last cloudy tendrils, and stars winked to life all across the velvet sky. Lily and Petunia pulled the rain fly off their tent, leaving the mesh ceiling open to the sky so they could watch for falling stars.

"If it starts to rain, you can join me," Severus whispered as he bade Lily goodnight.

"Thanks," she said, smiling up through her lashes.

Severus zipped himself into the old tent and settled into his musty sleeping bag. A jumbled fantasy of Lily crawling into the sleeping bag with him kept floating through his thoughts. _Please rain, please rain, please rain_, he mouthed. It was a long time before he fell into a restless sleep, the fire still crackling and popping beside the whispering loch.

When Severus heard the first pattering drops on his tent, he startled awake and sat up quickly, all of his senses alert. After a brief lull, the finger-light tapping on the canvas grew louder and steadier. Severus punched the ground in triumph—it was raining.

He settled back and closed his eyes to slits as he waited, hardly breathing.

Then he heard it—someone was tapping at the canvas door of his tent.

"Sev?" Lily's voice whispered. "Sev, can I come in?"

"Yeah," Severus said at once. He sat up and tugged down the zipper on the door. It was raining so hard that he couldn't see anything; he whispered "_lumos_," and his wand flared to life beside his sleeping bag.

Lily had her sleeping bag bundled in her arms. She ducked into the tent and helped Severus wrestle the door closed, her wet hair hanging across her face in limp strands.

"Where's Petunia?" Severus asked as Lily slid her feet into her sleeping bag.

"She went to my parent's tent." Lily giggled. "I told her I'd use a spell to keep the rain out, and she _ran_."

Severus snorted. "I can't believe she wanted to go to Hogwarts. She's such a wuss."

Suddenly he was conscious of how close they were. The tiny tent was made for two, and once they both lay down, there would be no way to keep their shoulders from touching.

"Well, hopefully we don't all blow away by morning," Lily said. "And thanks for letting me come in here. Goodnight."

With an open, inviting smile, she lay back, her sleeping bag shrugged up around her shoulders. Her red hair pooled in damp tangles beneath her head. Then she rolled to her side, her back rounding so her spine rested along Severus's leg.

"_Nox_," Severus whispered. He lay carefully back and stared at the tent roof, his whole body on fire. If he did something wrong—if Lily thought he was assaulting her—she would never forgive him. It would be the end of everything. But she wasn't stupid, and she _had_ come to him in the tent…

Moving very carefully, as though Lily was a flower he might crush, Severus rolled towards her until their bodies met. Then he slid one cold hand around her waist.

Lily reached for his hand and wove her fingers with his. Her skin was warm, and he could feel her pulse beating in time with his heart. She curled her knees back and shifted farther into his embrace. Just as he'd always dreamed, Severus buried his face in her hair and pulled her closer. She smelled of wild rain.

In the dark of the tent, Severus's face split in a fierce grin.


	9. Chapter 9: The Hut by the Lake

Many apologies for the delay. I'll try to post much more regularly from now on. Thanks for your patience, and happy 2013!

Chapter 9

Severus awoke to a shrill squeal. He struggled to open his eyes; he was groggy and very warm. Eventually Petunia's sharp face swam into view above him. Then he realized that Lily was still curled in his arms, sleeping bag shrugged down to her waist.

He fumbled for his wand. "Get out of here, you wretched muggle," he hissed.

Lily stirred against his chest, and he managed to close his hand around the wand he'd shoved unceremoniously against the back of the tent.

"Don't be mean, Sev," Lily mumbled. Then she bolted upright. "Tuney! My god, you've got to get out of here!"

Petunia was staring at Severus, though, with a dangerous gleam in her eyes. "Don't you dare curse me, Severus Snape. I'll scream. If Mum finds you two, she'll never let you see each other again."

"I could shut you up before I cursed you, you bloody idiot," Severus said under his breath. He rose to his knees, until the end of his wand was level with Petunia's clenched jaw.

"Tuney, please just—what was that?"

Severus hadn't noticed anything. Maybe Lily was just trying to distract them both. Then he heard it—a distant, broken scream, in a voice so high and tinny it had to belong to a child.

Lily squeezed Severus's hand under the sleeping bag. "Someone's hurt."

Throwing aside the pillows, Severus leapt to his feet and shoved Petunia out of the doorway. For once Lily didn't object. They yanked on their shoes and started running for the far shore of the loch, an icy drizzle stinging their faces. The clouds were so low that Severus could barely make out the pebble-strewn beach, let alone any figure standing alone in the gloom.

As they rounded a bend, Lily skidded on a glistening stone and grabbed Severus's arm for balance; pausing to help her, he heard clattering footsteps behind them.

"Stop following us!" Severus yelled, turning and again brandishing his wand at Petunia. His hair was plastered to his cheek, and he shook it away in irritation.

Again the shrill wail echoed through the valley. Lily glared at Severus before taking off at a dead run once again, the pebbles skittering and clacking with each footfall.

Severus didn't have time for Petunia's pigheadedness. He muttered, "_Impedimenta_," and raced to catch up with Lily as Petunia slowed to a halt.

Halfway around the lake Lily slowed and peered left into a narrow, gloomy split between the hills.

"It came from here," she said, breathing hard.

Severus stopped beside her and bent forward, trying to catch his breath. "Yeah. What's that?" He thought he could see a dark structure through the fog—it could be a bridge or an old herder's shed.

Lily shook her head. "What would anyone be doing back there?"

Severus shrugged. "Wands out, just to be safe." He tightened his grip on his own wand.

Not looking at each other, they began to creep along the ravine. Severus was nervous, but his spine was also tingling from excitement. If Lily got in trouble and he had to save her, he would have an excuse to show off one of his powerful new spells. She would have to admire him; she wouldn't call the spell cruel if it kept her safe.

The fog grew heavier as they neared the building, and the hair all along Severus's arms stood on end. Soon they could see that it was definitely a shed or a hut of some sort, the wood rotting away from the nails and the windows boarded up. It could be cursed, Severus thought with a sudden chill. Old buildings were often ripe with Dark magic, curses and wards that twisted in strange ways over the years.

Lily stopped abruptly just paces from the door. Severus strode past her, pretending he wasn't afraid, and put a hand on the dripping doorknob. Taking three deep breaths, he pushed open the door.

It was too dark inside to see. Severus heard a series of low male voices, and then something pummeled him in the stomach. He staggered, so startled he nearly dropped his wand.

Beside him, Lily struggled silently against the invisible hands of her captors. A second later her wand clattered to the stone floor.

"Get off her!" Severus yelled. "_Stupefy!_ _Relashio!_"

Lily squealed. Swearing, Severus lowered his wand, afraid he would hit her in the dark.

Four rough, sharp-nailed hands seized Severus by the wrists and shoulders and forced him to the ground, where he was slammed into muggle handcuffs and chained to something behind him. His wand was wrested from him, and as his eyes began to adjust to the darkness, he saw its new owner examining it roughly.

"Lily?" Severus hissed.

She made a small noise of assent.

"Don't say anything. Let me talk."

At last one of their captors struck a match and held it to a lantern, which hissed to life and threw the room into sudden sharp relief.

The whole place was clearly enchanted. From the outside it had looked to Severus as though he could have crossed the space in two strides, but now he could see that the room was larger than the Slytherin common room. The grimy stone floor was scattered with pillows and straw sleeping pallets, and a fire that reeked of peat was burning in a stone fireplace perched incongruously against the back wall. Beside it lay a battered cauldron heaped full of floo powder. A long, sturdy table dominated the center of the room, and around it stood at least twenty people, more than half of them younger than Severus.

"What've you done to him?" Lily asked in a choked voice.

Severus's eyes snapped to one of the pallets by his feet, where a small boy lay curled and whimpering. He clutched one hand to his shoulder, which was dark with something that looked like dried blood.

"Who are you?" Severus spat, glaring from one rough face to the next. He and Lily were unarmed and outnumbered; the only way out was to fool the fierce vagabonds into thinking he was more powerful or more important than he looked. Curling his lip, he met the eyes of the tallest man. "I hadn't heard of any mass breakouts from Azkaban, but…"

One of the teenage boys snarled at Severus. He could have been fourteen or fifteen, but his face was haggard and his eyes wild.

A filthy man stepped forward, lips pulled back. His teeth were prematurely cracked and yellowing, and, like the boy, he had wild black eyes. On his way around the table he kicked the child on the floor; both Lily and the small boy gasped. Finally the man stopped in front of Severus. He reeked of sweat and pond scum.

"You might've heard of me," he said, leering at Severus. "Greyback. Fenrir Greyback."


	10. Chapter 10: In the Lair of the Wolves

Chapter 10

Lily was still staring at the boy on the floor. "You bit him, didn't you?" She sounded furious. "And these children—they're werewolves too."

Greyback reached down and dug a sharp fingernail into Lily's jaw; she cowered against the beam she was tied to.

"Get your filthy hands off her!" Severus yelled.

Greyback ignored him. "You got a problem with that, missy? Want to have us all rounded up and killed?"

"Of course not!" Lily straightened once more and glared at Greyback. "But this isn't an accident. You've been targeting children."

"Well done." Greyback turned and paced back to the table, where he rejoined the other werewolves. "You're a smart one, eh? Fancy joining our team? We're starved for a bit of womanflesh."

"Shut the hell up," Severus said furiously. What did the foul creatures want from them? But he wasn't going to wait and find out. Hoping to distract them from Lily, he said, "Who enchanted this place for you?"

One of the older werewolves narrowed his eyes. "We done it ourselves, ain't we?"

Severus tried his best at a derisive laugh, though it came out a bit too high-pitched and nervous. "Not bloody likely. If you knew a thing about magic, you'd be taking your pick of wizard boys from a mansion in London, not squatting in this dungheap. Who put you here?"

Greyback snorted. "The Dark Lord, of course." He put a hand to his tattered left sleeve, though Severus doubted he had a Dark Mark. "And he'll come when I summon him." He bared his teeth.

"Isn't that lucky," Severus said coldly. "Why don't you call him here straightaway, then? I would love to have a chat. I'll be joining him as soon as I finish school, you know." He carefully didn't look at Lily. "I bet he would be interested to hear how you treat his supporters."

Greyback spat on the grimy floor. "Lies! Cromwell, throw the girl in the cellar."

"No!" Severus tried to stand, forgetting he was still chained, and grazed his arm on the beam. "We're good friends of the Malfoy family. You'll be tortured if you hurt us, I swear."

Greyback strode forward and slammed Severus's shoulder into the beam. "Prove it," he growled.

Severus glanced from Lily to the crowd of hungry werewolves. He needed time to think. Suddenly he had an idea, inspired by Greyback's unmarked left wrist hovering inches from his face. He was smarter than Greyback; he could flaunt a Dark Mark of his own.

"I need my wand," Severus said. "I won't duel any of you, I swear—I'm outnumbered. Just for a minute. You won't be sorry."

Greyback hesitated before shoving Severus's wand back into his chained hand.

"I'll need to be unchained, too," Severus said, "and we have to go outside. Trust me. You can leave the girl here."

Greyback unlocked the handcuffs—with a tiny metal key, not a wand—and escorted Severus roughly through the door.

Even with the heavy mist, Severus stood blinking for a moment before his eyes adjusted to the light. Only Greyback and the older wizard had followed him, though they left the door open.

Severus took a firm, desperate grip on his wand and willed the spell to work. Even he had trouble with this one sometimes. Raising his wand, he took a deep breath and shouted, "_Morsmordre!_"

The spell was reluctant to fire off, but after a terrifying pause a burst of green light shot skyward, where it resolved into a wavering skull and serpent, twisting and shimmering in midair above the hovel.

"Not many know that spell," Severus said quietly.

Greyback's face had gone slack as he stared at the Dark Mark. "Fine," he said at last. "You can go. Take your little girlfriend and get away from this place, y'hear me?" Looking disgruntled, he followed Severus back inside.

"We can go," Severus whispered, dropping to his knees beside Lily.

Jerking Lily's hands back, Greyback unlocked the handcuffs. Before she could stagger to her feet, he grabbed her chin and dug his clawed nails in hard. Lily gasped.

"The Dark Lord's gonna hear about you," Greyback hissed as he returned Lily's wand.

"Good." Severus grabbed Lily's hand and helped her to her feet. "Send him my regards." He kicked the door open.

Only when the door had fallen shut behind them did Severus realize how fast his heart was thudding. Standing hand-in-hand, he and Lily stared at each other for a long time. Her pale face shone green in the light from the fading Dark Mark, and a trickle of blood had welled out from one of the deep indents left by Greyback's claws. Severus knew he didn't look much better.

"I didn't know you could do that," Lily whispered at long last.

Severus cast another look at the Dark Mark and nodded grimly. "Let's get out of here."

Lily took a tighter grip on his hand, and he wiped the blood gently from her chin with his thumb. Then they started back towards the lake, feet sinking into the boggy turf with each hurried step.

The fog lifted slightly when they reached the end of the ravine; when Severus squinted, he could see three figures running towards them.

"Brilliant," he muttered.

Lily shook her head. "My god, if they had followed us all the way to that shack…but it doesn't matter now. We've got to help those kids."

"How?" The icy drizzle was starting to soak through Severus's clothes, and he gave an involuntary shiver.

"We'll tell a teacher," Lily said. She was still very white despite her confident tone. "Someone we both trust."

"LILY!" Mr. Evans roared from beside the water. Petunia and Mrs. Evans had fallen behind. "LILY, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?"

Lily and Severus looked at each other, slowing to a halt.

"I'll handle them," Lily said after a pause.

Severus gave her hand a grateful squeeze before releasing it.

A moment later Mr. Evans staggered up to Severus and Lily, winded and furious. "Oh, Lily, are you hurt?" he panted. "You can't go wandering off like that! Especially not with—"

Severus's lip curled. Mr. Evans didn't trust him; he clearly thought Severus had done something to Lily. What had Petunia told her parents? Were they imagining physical abuse, or something worse—something magical?

"I'm fine," Lily said firmly. Severus admired her assurance. "We just went for a walk. I'm not a _child_."

Mr. Evans glanced over his shoulder to where Petunia and Mrs. Evans had paused, now within shouting distance. "Petunia tells me you claimed to hear strange noises, and went running off after threatening her with your wand." He glared at Severus. "Ever since you turned up and Lily started playing around with magic, you both seem to have decided you're invincible. Well, you still live under our roof, Lily." He turned his scowl on her. "I don't care what sort of trouble you get up to at school. When you're home, you're not to spend the night with boys, or put yourself deliberately in danger!"

Lily folded her arms stubbornly. "I swear, nothing happened! And Sev certainly didn't hurt me. He followed me to keep me safe."

"Dad!" Petunia yelled, finally stumbling up to where the three of them stood and grabbing her father's arm. "Severus was going to curse me!"

"Not now, honey," Mrs. Evans said. "Lily, what's wrong? You're pale as death!"

Lily shook her head, damp red hair flapping against her cheeks. "I'm just cold. Stop fussing!"

"But Mum," Petunia whined, "that awful boy used his wand! And he was sleeping with Lily! In the _same tent!_"

Mrs. Evans pulled off her sweater and draped it over Lily's shoulders. "That's enough," she said firmly. "We'll cook up a bit of porridge for breakfast and then head back home. Severus, I trust you can find a way to amuse yourself on your own for a few weeks. Lily needs to spend some time with her family."

Without waiting for Severus and Lily to argue, Mrs. Evans put an arm around Lily's waist and steered her back towards the lake. Severus gave a long sigh and followed. All of his plans were ruined. What were they supposed to do about the werewolf children? Not that Severus was particularly fond of werewolves—he'd like nothing better than to give Lupin a good thumping—but he couldn't get the image of the tiny, sobbing boy out of his head.

More to the point, he was going to miss Lily terribly. It was as though last night had been a dream, wonderful but too insubstantial to last out the dawn.

Breakfast was a quiet affair. Mr. Evans stomped around folding up the three tents while Severus and Lily perched on the same rock, shoulders pressed together as they cradled steaming bowls of porridge.

"You'll keep reading, won't you?" Lily whispered.

Severus nodded. "The books are due back soon in any case," he said softly. "I'll write down everything important."

"Send me an owl if you learn anything."

The fog was beginning to break up at last when they piled into the car and commenced the drive south. Their encounter with Greyback replayed through Severus's mind as he watched the farmland roll past; as he recalled what he had said, he was again amazed that he and Lily had made it out alive. He must have been a very convincing liar—or had he unwittingly spoken the truth? He gritted his teeth and stared at the back of Mr. Evans's head, unwilling to consider that possibility.

Severus's mum was waiting for him in the kitchen when he returned home.

"You're back early," she said vaguely. "A letter just arrived for you. From the Malfoy family."

Severus took the proffered envelope and frowned at it. "How do you know who it's from?"

"I recognized the owl, didn't I?" his mum said. "It's the same one Abraxus had when I was in school. Very flashy."

Shaking his head, Severus tore open the letter. He'd always admired Lucius, but the former Head Boy had never found a reason to write to him before.

The letter wasn't from Lucius, though. It was from his father.

_Dear Mr. Snape,_

_Lucius speaks highly of you. I have it from the werewolf Fenrir Greyback that you and an unfamiliar girl recently paid a visit to his dwelling, and that you reasserted your readiness to pledge yourself to the Dark Lord. Please join me and my family for supper in one week's time. I will gladly provide a portkey if your residence is not connected to the floo network. _

_Kind regards,_

_A. Malfoy _

Severus folded the letter very deliberately and set it aside. The invitation was not a generous offer; it was a command. He had no choice but to pay the Malfoys a visit.


	11. Chapter 11: Knockturn Alley

Chapter 11

A tapping on his tiny window woke Severus before the sun was properly up. He immediately recognized Lily's small, graceful barn owl, Mirabella, and crawled reluctantly from his bed to let it in.

"What're you doing here already?" he grumbled as Mira hopped down to his bedpost and tilted her head, letting out a hoot that sounded more like a hiccup. The owl barely moved as Severus untied the letter and spread it on his lap.

_Dear Sev,_

_Since you don't have an owl, I told Mira to stay with you until you've written me back. Meanwhile, I'll be drafting a letter to Professor Dumbledore. I know you admire him too. He will know what to do about the children. _

_My family will be repainting the entire kitchen (ugh!), and then we'll visit my aunt and uncle in Ireland. After that I expect I'll be allowed to see you again. Until then, write me as much as you can!_

_Love from _

_Lily _

_P.S. I gave Mira a treat earlier this morning, so don't let her beg one off you. _

Severus had to read the letter twice before anything but the line "love from Lily" registered. Then he dashed downstairs for a quill and parchment and jotted a hasty reply.

_Lily-_

_I'm returning your owl now so you can get that letter off to Dumbledore right away. No new insights yet, but the Malfoys invited me to dinner in a week. Not looking forward to it. _

_Missing you already,_

_Severus _

When Mira gave a cluck and dove through the open window, the new letter strapped to one foot, Severus got dressed and carried three of the books on Dark magic down to the kitchen. He was soon so engrossed in reading that he forgot to eat his toast with marmalade.

He was halfway through the second book before he remembered with a start that Bellatrix was expecting him in Knockturn Alley the next morning. He set aside the book and rubbed his tired eyes in annoyance. At least he didn't have to explain the unwelcome excursion to Lily. And at the rate he was tearing through the library books, he would be finished in time to return them on his way into London.

Severus was nibbling at his toast and rereading an intriguing passage on detecting Dark magic when his mum ambled into the kitchen.

"Morning," she said. "I must say, I've never seen you quite this dedicated to your schoolwork. What is that you're reading?"

Severus put a hand casually over the one book with a title—_Delving into the Dark Arts_—embossed on the cover. "Nothing much," he said. "Actually, Mum, could you give me a ride into London tomorrow? I'm meeting a few people in Diagon Alley."

Sighing, his mum spooned liberal amounts of sugar into her tea. "I know it's Saturday, but the International Magical Liaison department asked everyone involved with potions to come in this weekend. They just got a rather large shipment of Deflating Draught from Romania, and want to make sure there are no problems. You'll have to ask your father to drive you, I'm afraid."

Severus grimaced. "That's bound to go well." He had been avoiding his father ever since the disastrous dinner party, and didn't want to think about what his father would say if he got wind of Severus's camping trip.

It would be hours before his father returned home, though, so Severus settled down in the sitting room and tackled the final two Dark Arts books in his stack.

The first had clearly been shelved incorrectly. It consisted solely of an argument for sentencing all practitioners of Dark magic to a lifetime in Azkaban, and Severus threw it aside in disgust.

The final book looked more promising. It was titled simply _Dark Magic_, and within ten pages it had provided highly detailed instructions to three blood-barrier curses and a theory of mental possession. Best of all, it contained a spell that would allow the caster to detect Dark magic in any form.

"Aha!" Severus muttered, spreading the book flat on his knees. If the spell was as good as it looked, it would be invaluable. Severus could snoop on whatever Dark magic the Malfoy family was dabbling in, and search for traces of the Dark Lord's work, without anyone getting wind of what he did.

The spell required an elaborate setup, though nothing as fiddly or time-consuming as most potions, and once activated could be recalled by a simple nonverbal spell. Apparently it became an intuitive sensitivity to Dark magic over time.

It was brilliant.

Almost feverish with excitement now, Severus jumped from his chair and ran to the kitchen for the ingredients he would need. Ignoring his mum's frown, he set a pot of water on the stove and brought a glass of ice up to his room. As he knew from his previous reading, this spell was rightly categorized as Dark magic, because it exacted a physical price on the caster—pain. Severus had to light a short candle and tie a feather to its base, and then submerge one hand in boiling water and once in ice. He had to repeat the words of the spell over and over as the candle burned lower, until finally the feather caught fire and the spell was complete. The author promised there would be no marks left from the boiling water, though the pain would be experienced in full.

When everything was set up properly, Severus hurried the pot of water upstairs and shoved a chair against his door. Then he sat cross-legged on the floor and lit the candle.

At the first touch of the boiling water, Severus swore loudly, his face contorting in pain. Quickly he gasped out the words of the spell—_Revelio arcanum oscuro… _His eyes watered, and he started choking when he reached his third recitation. He couldn't feel his left hand at all, and his right hand burned raw and swollen. He drew a shuddering breath and started the words again, trying to see Lily's hair in the flame. The heat was just her hands around his…"_Revelio Arcanum—_argh! Bloody hell—_arcanum oscuro…_"

The feather was beginning to smoke. Severus bit his lip, and finally it sparked into flame. Yanking his hands from the water, Severus collapsed back on the floor, drawing in a long, hissing breath. If the spell hadn't worked…

But when he looked at his hands, there was no sign of the extreme heat or cold. His skin was faintly pink, as though he'd just washed his hands. That was all.

When he'd regained his breath, Severus reached for his wand and, still lying on the floor, thought the words of the spell.

Nothing happened.

He sighed and sat up. He had been hoping one of the books on Dark magic was cursed, just so he could see how the spell worked before he tried it in public. But there was no hope for it now; he would have to save his experimentation for Knockturn Alley.

Severus's father was in a somewhat less foul mood than usual when he arrived home, though Severus was no longer worried about their inevitable argument. It didn't seem like much compared to what he'd put himself through this morning.

"I think Severus wants a word with you," his mum said nervously as his father slouched into the kitchen.

"You call this bloody respect, do you?" his father snapped. "Not a word about my day; you don't give a damn that I keep you fed and clothed and—"

"I'm truly sorry, dear," Severus's mum said meekly. "Did something good happen today?"

"I'll say," he muttered.

Severus edged into the kitchen and busied himself scrubbing dishes. His father had taken a seat, clearly not in the mood for a real fight.

"Well?" his mum prompted.

His father grunted. "I got a promotion! Bigger office and all."

As his mum started going on about how delighted she was, Severus glared at a teacup. It was a while before Severus dared to broach the subject of driving to London tomorrow, but in the end his father agreed to do it if Severus helped clean and set up the new office.

Severus thanked his father repeatedly, wishing he was old enough to Apparate.

The next morning Severus dressed in his least conspicuous muggle clothes, folded up a pair of robes to don once he reached the Leaky Cauldron, and gathered his library books. He hadn't gotten around to reading very many of the volumes on immortality, but that no longer seemed like such a pressing concern. Last night he had copied out the exact method the vanished author had used to open the portal in the ground, and the instructions were now folded carefully away at the back of his potions book. At the last minute he shoved the final book—_Dark Magic_—under his pillow. It was too valuable to relinquish just yet. Surely the library would over look its absence.

Neither Severus nor his father spoke a word on the drive to London. Just as they were pulling up to the library, Severus's father said, "It's a lucky thing you wizards don't have to lift a finger for yourselves. All this magic's done is let you get soft in the head. If that school kicked you out, you'd be worthless."

At this, his father slammed on the brakes and waited for Severus to clamber out, smiling nastily.

It was all Severus could do to bite back a furious reply. He couldn't tell whether his father referred to the fact that most muggle children his age had drivers' licenses by now, or whether he was just angry about magic in general.

Hoisting the bag of books firmly onto his shoulder, Severus slammed the car door and marched up the library steps.

As soon as he climbed the hidden stairs to nowhere and emerged into the Wizards' Wing, Severus could see the high, lonely shelf where the rest of the Dark Arts books were stacked. He was very tempted to take home as many as he could carry—but that would be asking for trouble. No decent librarian would fail to report such a serious interest in the Dark Arts.

So he lowered his gaze and descended the spiraling marble staircase, relieved to see that the librarian on duty was unfamiliar. This one was a young, dark-haired woman who was reading a highly-colored book with an expression of delight.

"Good morning!" she said brightly when she noticed Severus. "I see you have a few books to return."

Severus nodded and began stacking the books on her desk, deliberately piling the immortality volumes on top of the Dark Arts titles.

"An interesting selection," the woman said. "What's the occasion?"

"School project," Severus said brusquely.

She smiled. "Ah, Abraham Drabb, is it?" She pulled out the book that contained instructions for the portal. "Quite an amusing man, he was, though he went a bit funny towards the end. Wrote quite a few travelogues before this one."

It was a while before Severus managed to escape the woman's enthusiastic chatter; thankfully she didn't flip back through the records and not that one book was missing from his stack.

Back in the main library, Severus glanced at the clock in annoyance. He was going to be late meeting his friends.

He fingered his wand impatiently the whole ride on the muggle underground, half-convinced he could Apparate from sheer force of will.

At last he reached the Leaky Cauldron, where he pulled his robes over his muggle clothes and nearly ran down the street to Knockturn Alley. He found his friends sitting around a table in the Black Chimaera, the only pub in Knockturn Alley that allowed underage wizards. The room was dimly lit and hazy with multicolored smoke.

"Severus!" Bellatrix called lazily, waving him over. "I was beginning to think you'd forgotten." She gave him a toothy smile. "Grab yourself a firewhisky."

Severus took a seat beside Avery. "No, I'm fine, thanks." He didn't have any money.

Wilkes and Mulciber were there as well, and all four had bulging bags at their feet. In hopes of distracting them from his refusal of a drink, Severus said, "Were you shopping for schoolbooks already? Bit early, isn't it?"

"We got bored waiting for you to show up," Mulciber said, swirling the remains of his firewhisky. "Besides, it's much better when there are no pigheaded first-years around. We get enough of them at school."

Just then Wilkes started choking on his butterbeer, and Avery pounded him on the back. Severus noticed that Wilkes had a new fur satchel propped beside his shopping bags.

"So you made it to Durmstrang, then?" Severus asked.

Wilkes nodded, a bit purple in the face. "Awful grim fortress they've got up there, but them classes are somethin' else. Stuff like centaur-wrestling and fire-throwing an' the like." And lots of Dark magic."

Bellatrix turned to Severus, a taunting, feline smile spreading across her face. "Speaking of _travel_…Narcissa tells me the Malfoys have it from Greyback that you and a certain _red-headed Mudblood_ were doing some traveling together last week." She lifted an eyebrow. "Care to elaborate?"

Silently Severus cursed the interfering Lestranges. He just wanted to get up and leave the stuffy, dark pub. He didn't want to deal with his so-called friends. Instead he tried his best to sneer.

"What would I be doing with that awful—girl?" Severus tried to say 'mudblood,' but the word caught in his throat. "Clean out your ears, Bellatrix. Greyback said 'red-haired girl,' not 'Lily Evans.' We were visiting my _cousin_, you idiot."

"Is that a muggle cousin?" Avery asked sharply.

"Of course," Severus said darkly. "And she's a real brat. If you've got a problem with that, bring it up with the Dark Lord. He's got a whole bloody muggle family."

"Not no more," Wilkes said.

"Yeah." Mulciber smirked. "Killed them all, didn't he?" He snapped his fingers. "Gone without a trace."

Avery downed his drink and asked for another, and Wilkes sipped at his butterbeer. Bellatrix just stared at Severus, heavily lidded eyes half-closed.

At last Avery leaned in closer to the others and whispered, "Is it true, what they're saying? The Dark Lord's gathering an army?"

Severus glanced over his shoulder at the nearest table, but the grim-looking circle of hooded wizards didn't appear to have heard.

"How else can you explain the werewolves?" Mulciber asked excitedly. "He's getting ready for war."

"Who's on his side, d'you reckon?" Wilkes asked.

"The werewolves, obviously," Avery said. "And I've heard he's trying to recruit giants and dementors, too."

Severus tried not to grimace. He despised dementors. He had come near one once, while it was searching for a thief who'd broken into the Department of Mysteries, and the experience had left him sullen and depressed for weeks.

"I heard something better than that," Bellatrix said haughtily. She dropped her voice so Severus and the others had to lean in to hear. "The Dark Lord is building an army of Inferi. _That's_ where all the muggles go—the ones he kills."

Bellatrix sat back, clearly relishing their expressions of shock. Severus wasn't sure he believed her, but he had a difficult time concealing his distaste. Dementors and Inferi were two creatures so evil they should not exist. No decent wizard could look to them as allies.

"I wish he'd take us now," Avery said, cracking his knuckles.

"Two years," Bellatrix said, her eyes lit with feverish excitement. "Just two more years."

Severus couldn't bring himself to smile.


	12. Chapter 12: A Collection of Curses

Chapter 12

Soon enough, Bellatrix suggested they leave the Black Chimaera and have a look around some of their favorite shops.

"There've never been so many Dark artifacts in London before," Mulciber said with a knowing smirk. "Cursed goods are coming in from all over the world. With the Dark Lord gaining popularity, the market's never been better."

Mulciber's father worked for the Ministry department responsible for regulating the sale of Dark objects, but he mainly assured that these fell into the hands of shopkeepers friendly with the family.

It was beginning to rain when they left the pub, so they hugged the walls of the narrow alley, ducking beneath the dripping overhangs.

"In here," Bellatrix said when they reached Borgin and Burke's. The dim, overstuffed shop was crowded, but at least it would be dry. Severus followed Mulciber grimly, and had to shoulder a foul-smelling hag out of the way before he could close the door behind him. If it weren't for the Dark-detecting spell he wanted to try, Severus would have liked nothing better than to leave this dreary place.

"You reckon that book's here?" Wilkes asked, licking his lips excitedly.

"What book?" Severus asked quickly.

Bellatrix laughed. "A gift for your girlfriend, right, Mulciber?"

He snorted.

Turning back to Severus, Bellatrix said, "It's a new cursed book his father passed along. Beautiful thing—can't stop reading it once you start, and when you reach the end you shrivel up and die. Makes a lovely sight."

Severus forced himself to laugh. As his comrades forced their way to the front of the shop to speak with Borgin, he slid a hand into his pocket and grasped his wand. _Revelio arcanum obscuro._

Nothing happened. Severus cursed under his breath and took a firmer grip on the wand. _Revelio arcanum obscuro!_

He had just spun in a slow circle, searching for any sign whatsoever that something had happened, when a fierce gust of icy wind caught him in the chest. He whirled, but the shop door was firmly shut.

"Oi! Watch yerself!" barked a stout, gargoyle-faced man, dragging a chipped vase out of Severus's reach.

Severus just glared at him. The wind had died as quickly as it had come.

_Revelio arcanum obscuro!_

Again the wind slammed Severus, but this time he could tell that it came from several directions at once. The spell was working! As the streams of icy air began to taper away, Severus turned in the direction of the most powerful wind. Lying on a velvet block just a few feet before him was a very plain dagger, crude and rusted so badly that several holes gaped in the blade. He wouldn't have noticed it at all if his attention hadn't been drawn to it. Severus grinned in triumph—so this unremarkable dagger was the most powerful Dark artifact in a store crammed with magic.

Mulciber elbowed him sharply. "What're you so pleased about?" he hissed.

Severus blinked. "Just—just remembering the muggle we gave that cursed teacup to last year," he said hurriedly.

When Mulciber scowled at him and rejoined the others, Severus sidled over to Borgin's portly assistant and said, "Excuse me, sir, but do you know what this dagger does?"

Irritation quickly turned to suspicion on the man's face as he saw where Severus was pointing. "And what would a schoolboy want with something like that?" he asked sharply.

Severus shrugged. "Curiosity. I'm not about to buy it, if that's what you're worried about."

The man glanced from Borgin back to Severus before shuffling closer. In a low voice, he said, "It's a very old curse, said to bind men to the wielder. But the wielder pays for it in years of his lifespan. Bind too many and you're dead."

"How does it work?" Severus asked eagerly.

The assistant seemed to remember himself and stepped back, frowning once again. "Go bother someone else, young man. I have _paying_ customers to attend to."

With a sharp nod, Severus turned and shoed his way through the crowd to Wilkes's side. Bellatrix haggling gleefully with Borgin, but he couldn't concentrate on what they were saying.

_A dagger that can bind men_…Severus wondered with a sudden chill whether a Dark Mark might be more than just an outward sign. Maybe the Dark Lord's binding ran deeper than that—maybe it _changed_ a person. And Severus did not like that idea at all.

It was with relief that Severus left his friends at last, though he had to find a pay phone and beg his father to come get him. The ride home was far from pleasant. His father was convinced that Severus had deliberately ruined his day, and went on about how worthless and greedy Severus had become. It was a familiar rant, but that didn't make it sting any less. Severus maintained a stony silence, trying to distract himself by imagining what Lily was doing.

By the time they reached their dingy street, the rain was coming down harder than ever and Severus had a pounding headache. He gave his headache as an excuse to escape supper, and his father shouted at him the whole way up the stairs.

"GOOD-FOR-NOTHING, INSOLENT LITTLE BAS—"

Severus slammed the door and sank onto his bed, wishing he could risk the _muffliato_ spell. Apart from his discovery that the Dark-detection spell worked, the day had been a colossal waste.

Several hours later, once the streetlights had blossomed beneath the relentless sheen of rain, Severus's mum tiptoed upstairs with a bowl of soup and a glass of Pepperup Potion.

"Thanks, Mum," Severus said, massaging his temples. "I don't think I'm sick, though. I'll be fine tomorrow."

She nodded and set the bowl and glass on his bedside table. "Drink the potion anyway, would you?" Then she did something she hadn't done in years—she leaned over and kissed Severus on the forehead.

"G'night, Mum," Severus mumbled, surprised.

Then he was alone once more.

He drank the steaming potion in one gulp and spent longer stirring the noodle soup, breathing in the gentle aroma. His headache had concentrated and intensified in two points just above his forehead, where it felt as though someone was drilling a pair of nails straight through his skull. He was afraid this was a side-effect of the Dark spell he'd used, unless it was Bellatrix's idea of a practical joke. Desperately he thumbed through _Dark Magic_, the book he'd saved, but there was no warning attached to the spell he had used. A few of the spells required gruesome sacrifices, but this one was meant to be straightforward after the initial pain of setting it up.

Eventually he slipped into an uneasy sleep, the light still on and the book splayed open on his chest, only to jolt upright as a wave of pain fiercer than ever shot through his skull. He was getting a bit scared now. What if something had gone horribly wrong?

Hissing a string of curses, he stumbled from bed and down to the bathroom, where he splashed water on his face and stared at his white, frightened reflection. Then he gave a yelp. Protruding from his forehead, nearly covered by his greasy black hair, were a pair of bony knobs like horns. When Severus touched one gently, he was hit with a wave of nausea.

It was definitely a curse.

Still weak, Severus staggered back up to his room, where he paced three times from the door to the window. What could he do? He couldn't confide in his parents, and he couldn't write to Dumbledore without an owl. He had only one choice.

Pulling on his coat and tucking the book safely inside, Severus made his way downstairs and let himself out into the drenching rain. He needed Lily's help.


	13. Chapter 13: Overdue Fines

Chapter 13

Standing outside Lily's house, rain sopping through his hair and dripping down his chin, Severus nearly changed his mind. It was past midnight; if anyone besides Lily came to the door, they would likelier phone the police than let him in. But the icy rain had done nothing to soothe his headache. When the growing horns gave an especially painful twinge, he gritted his teeth and rapped on the door.

He needn't have worried. Within thirty seconds the door swung open, and Lily was ushering him inside. She was wearing rumpled blue pajamas, but she had a quill tucked behind one ear and looked wide awake.

"What are you doing here?" she whispered. "Mum won't be happy. You aren't locked out of your house, are you?" She took Severus's coat by the shoulders and eased it off. "Merlin's beard! What have you done to yourself?"

She had finally noticed the horns. "I don't know what they're from," Severus said shortly, following Lily into the dark kitchen. "But they hurt like mad. I have to go to St. Mungo's, unless you've got a better idea."

"Right," Lily said. "We'll have to borrow Dad's car. He'll kill us if he finds out, but we have about six hours before anyone wakes up. Give me a second."

Lily padded softly upstairs and returned a moment later wearing slacks and buttoning a sweater over her pajama top. "Let's go."

Severus held his breath as Lily started the car, afraid the whole block would wake to the sound of the sputtering engine, but the houses remained dark and silent as they turned the corner and picked up speed.

"You owe me an explanation," Lily said, glancing sternly at Severs as they passed the ruins of the old mill.

She was right. But admitting what he had done would mean confessing that he'd used their immortality research as an excuse to devour books on Dark magic behind Lily's back. He tried two lies, but they sounded ridiculous the moment he began. At last he slouched back in his seat and said, "You're going to hate me for this." Then he told Lily the truth.

When he had finished, Lily shook her head at him, and though he couldn't be certain in the dark, he thought she was smiling.

"What?" Severus said, scowling at her. "Have my horns grown spots or something?"

Lily giggled. "No, but they're not horns. They're _antlers_. And if we don't reach St. Mungo's soon, they'll poke a hole in the roof."

Severus did not find that amusing. "You're not angry, then?"

Lily dropped her left hand from the steering wheel and gave Severus's knee a brief squeeze. "Oh, Sev. I already knew you were more interested in those stupid Dark Arts books than anything else. And of course I wish you'd stop playing around with dangerous Dark magic, but that spell sounds brilliant."

Severus gave a startled laugh.

They were nearing the hospital now, and since no muggles were around at this time of night, they risked parking directly in front of the run-down department store façade. Clearly this was a common procedure, because moments later a man apparated nearly on top of Lily, who had just climbed out. He was clutching a small boy who was babbling shrilly in what sounded like Russian.

"Sorry, ma'am," the man sputtered when Lily stumbled out of the way.

Severus didn't want the man noticing that he and Lily were still underage; taking her arm, he steered her forcefully through the glass and into the hospital before the man could get a closer look.

Inside, the lights nearly blinded Severus and Lily, who halted and stood blinking until their eyes had adjusted. It was wonderfully warm and dry in the lobby, but as noisy and chaotic as a menagerie.

"Do wizarding families make a habit of dueling at night?" Lily muttered wryly. "I had no idea it would be this crowded past midnight!"

Severus snorted. "They probably just wanted to get here without the muggles staring." He lowered his voice. "Are you honestly not mad at me?"

Lily sighed. "I'm a bit annoyed, but I'm saving the lecture for after you get those ridiculous horns off."

"Antlers," Severus corrected, and they both laughed.

Eventually a woman whose hair seemed to be smothering her moved aside, and they spotted a tired-looking witch at the welcome desk. They pushed their way through the crowd to join the queue, behind a double-chinned warlock who was arguing fiercely with the exhausted Welcome Witch.

"I checked the records thoroughly last night, and I can assure you she was not officially released. Bring it up with the security guards." The witch took a long drink from a mug of coffee that would have been large for a giant.

The warlock finally stalked away when one of the security guards drew a wand on him, and Severus was able to step up to the desk.

"I'm not sure what happened—" Severus began, but the witch cut him off.

"I've seen antlers like yours before. Fourth floor, Spell Damage." And she waved them away with another gulp of coffee.

As they started up the stairs, Severus tried to catch a glimpse of his reflection in a dark windowpane. He could feel the weight of the antlers now, and his headache had, if anything, intensified.

"Do you think they'll report us?" he asked uneasily.

"A couple fifteen-year-olds who just happened to pick up a strange curse?" Lily snorted. "Of course they will. I just hope they'll contact someone at Hogwarts, not our parents."

Pausing on the second floor landing, they shared a look of dread. That would go over horribly.

When they reached the Spell Damage ward, the floor at first appeared deserted. Then a door swung open and a witch with a tea trolley backed into the hallway.

"Deary me," she said cheerfully, spotting Severus. "Another library curse, eh? You're the third this week."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Severus snapped. No one had a right to be so cheerful at this hour.

The witch clucked at him. "Right this way, my dears. No one reads the library terms before they take out books, I'm afraid. Tea, love?" She pressed a teacup into Lily' s hands before she could refuse, and herded the two of them into a ward labeled "Common Curses."

Most of the ward's occupants were asleep in crisp white beds, and the only light shone directly above a seated wizard who was desperately in need of a shave. Scratching at his grey stubble, he gestured for Severus and Lily to step closer.

"Let's not wake anyone," the wizard said in a gravelly voice. "You've figured out what's happened now, eh? This is what you get when you keep books from the London Library for too long."

"Oh, bloody hell!" Severus forgot to keep his voice down. He hadn't figured it out for himself, even after the absurdly cheerful witch had called it the "library curse." His exhausted brain wasn't serving him well.

"Hush." The wizard waved a hand impatiently at Severus. "We'll get rid of those antlers first, and then see about returning your overdue books. Though—blimey, I didn't think schoolchildren were allowed in the Wizard's Wing. The blokes up at Hogwarts will have to be informed, I suppose. And I hope you've got the books with you; it'd be a rotten bother to raid your house."

Severus glanced at Lily, panicked. He didn't want to give up his copy of _Dark Magic_, but he was even more worried about what the hospital would say when they saw what he'd been reading. "It's just one book," he said, barely moving his lips. "And I have it here."

"Jolly good," the wizard said, frowning at him. "Wait just one moment."

He shuffled to a dark corner of the room and returned with a small capped vial. "Drink it all," the wizard said. "The horns'll be gone in a trice."

"Just out of curiosity," Severus said, "why did the curse have to include a headache? Wouldn't the bloody horns have been enough?"

"We thought so, until some mad bloke decided he liked them so much he'd nick another book to see if he grew a second pair." The wizard chuckled.

Nodding grimly, Severus downed the vial. It took several swallows to clear the gritty taste from his throat. As the antlers began to shrink, a bolt of fiery pain shot down his spine; Severus reached instinctively for Lily's hand and nearly crushed it in his struggle to remain silent. Finally, reluctantly, the pain withdrew its claws, leaving Severus dizzy and drained. He reached a hand to his temple to confirm what he already knew—the antlers had vanished without a trace.

"Better?" Lily whispered.

Severus nodded and quickly released her hand. _What was I thinking?_

"Right," the wizard said, shuffling a mess of papers into a haphazard pile. "Let's get this over with. Name?"

Severus's first instinct was to lie, but that would get him in trouble with the ministry, not to mention Hogwarts and his parents. "Severus Snape."

"Age?"

"Sixteen."

The wizard scrawled a few illegible lines on a hospital form. "Residence?"

"Spinner's End, Cokeworth."

"And the overdue book"

Severus hesitated, staring down his nose at the rumpled parchment. At long last he sighed and reached inside his coat for the book. He feigned carelessness as he set the book in front of the wizard upside down; from the backside, it looked like an ancient, unassuming volume bound in peeling leather. But the wizard flipped it upright, of course, and Severus watched his brows knit together as he read the thin gold script that was scrawled across the cover.

"Well," the man grunted. "What have we here?" He gathered the book and the papers and clambered to his feet. "I'd say our ministry correspondent would want to hear about this, eh? Follow me."

"Please, sir," Severus said hurriedly, "it was just for a bit of research, for—for a school project."

The wizard scowled at him from the doorway. Lily dragged Severus to his feet and out to the hall. When the ward door fell shut, the wizard turned and strode for the stairs.

"That's interesting," he said, not slowing. "I was under the impression you kids went to Hogwarts. If you're studying Dark magic now, I'd say the minister would be wanting a word with your headmaster. But that's not for me to say. I'll let the ministry deal with you."

He stopped at the last door in the hall, which bore a tiny gold placard that read _Miriam Cummings, Ministry Correspondent._ "Good luck." He rapped twice on the door.

It was several minutes before the door opened, though they could hear shuffling and muffled thuds coming from within. At last a tall, severe-looking woman appeared, blinking and straightening her robes.

"Yes?" she said irritably. Evidently she had been asleep.

"Couple of kids showed up with a library curse just past one this morning," the wizard said, "and look at what they'd been reading." He shoved the book and the entire stack of papers into Miriam Cummings's hands.

Cummings's eyebrows rose so high they disappeared into her graying hair. "Thank you, Arty. Good night."

For a moment Cummings just peered suspiciously at Severus and Lily. Eventually she grunted and held open the door. "Well, come in. And sit down, why don't you; I'll have to contact someone at the ministry, I'm afraid. There have been a few odd reports lately—muggle torture and unexplained disappearances and the like—and always word that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is recruiting new followers. I'd hate to think that you kids had anything to do with those."

Severus shook his head hurriedly. "No, we aren't part of that, I swear. Besides, the Dark Lord won't take underage wizards."

Lily kicked him under the table, and Severus bit his tongue. That had been a stupid thing to say. He tried again. "Please, ma'am, could you let Lily go home before you speak with the ministry? She had nothing to do with this; she just gave me a ride into London, and she really shouldn't—"

Lily kicked him again.

"Sorry, kid, but you'll both have to wait. Now, if you would just keep quiet for a moment…"

Cummings rapped the empty grate with her wand and a fire sprang to life. Tossing in a pinch of floo powder, she said, "Ministry of Magic, Auror Division." She knelt on a cushion and leaned into the green flames.

"Uh-oh," Severus muttered.

Beside him, Lily paled.

"I'm really, _really_ sorry about this," Severus said out of the corner of his mouth. "When this is over, feel free to curse me or poison me or whatever the hell you want—"

"Oh, be quiet," Lily said, though her expression lightened marginally.

Severus didn't dare meet her eyes, but he was hugely relieved. "When we get home, there's something I need to tell you," he said.

"You can't just tell me now? I'll go mad trying to guess—"

She broke off, because the ministry witch had sat back on her heels and pulled her head from the flames.

"Bad news," Cummings said shortly, getting to her feet. "Alastor Moody wishes to speak to you in person. I'm to escort you to the ministry."


	14. Chapter 14: The Auror Headquarters

Chapter 14

As grim as Cummings had sounded, the matter of the library book clearly wasn't urgent enough to intrude on anyone's sleep. So Severus and Lily had to wait in the stuffy little office until the Ministry was actually open, which meant three hours of dozing in the uncomfortable wooden chairs. Around five-thirty, Severus jolted awake with his neck stuck at a painful angle. Lily was feigning sleep beside him, though she clutched her wand so tightly beneath the desk that it was liable to snap. Finally her eyes snapped open and she shook out her hair.

"Excuse me," she said loudly to Cummings, who had nodded off over a day-old copy of the _Daily Prophet_.

The witch jolted awake.

"Is there a phone here? My parents will be getting worried—I was supposed to be home by now."

"A _phone_? You're not a muggle, are you, girl? Aren't you hooked up to the floo network?"

Reddening, Lily shook her head.

Cummings coughed in annoyance. "Well, it so happens that we have a telephone down by the welcome desk, though it's usually reserved for the muggle hospital reporting odd cases. Be quick about it."

Severus and Lily jumped to their feet and hurried down the hall before Cummings could tell Severus to stay put.

"Oh, this is going to be a mess," Lily said under her breath. When they skidded to a halt in front of the welcome desk, the witch pushed her glasses up her nose and gave them a long, reproving look.

"You're the boy with the antlers," she said at last, with the air of having solved a complicated puzzle. "What is it this time?"

"Sorry," Lily panted, "but could use the telephone? It's urgent. The ministry lady sent us down here."

With a long sigh, the Welcome Witch rummaged in a drawer and produced a perfectly ordinary black telephone.

"Thank you!" Lily dialed her home and waited breathlessly for someone to pick up. Severus wanted to put his arms around her and tell her that he'd fix everything somehow, that she didn't need to worry—he would protect her from her parents and the Ministry and the Death Eaters. Instead he shoved his hands in his pockets.

"Mum?" Lily said at last. "Yes—no, I'm not home. I got called away by someone from school, but I should be home before tonight."

Lily glanced at Severus, and he nodded.

"No, nothing's wrong. You know how wizards can be, Mum."

Lily's green eyes narrowed as she listened to her mother's response.

"No, of course not, it's got nothing to do with him!"

Severus cursed under his breath. Typical—the moment something went wrong, everyone suspected him of being involved.

Lily tugged nervously at the phone cord. "Oh, and I borrowed the car, but I'll make sure it gets home safely. I'm really sorry. Bye!" She said this last in a rush, forestalling any protests from the other end. Then she slammed the phone down.

The Welcome Witch was watching them, wide-eyed.

"Thank you," Severus said firmly. He put a hand on Lily's back and steered her back to the stairway.

"Oh my god," Lily said as soon as they were alone. "Mum is going to be furious! She was nearly shouting, and she only does that when she's worried sick about me or Tuney. I'll be locked in my room for a year!"

Severus slid his arm the rest of the way around her waist. "No you won't. I'll tell them I kidnapped you; they can't blame you for that."

Lily giggled. "I bet they'd believe it, too."

Back in the tiny office, Cummings had changed into crisp black Ministry robes and pinned her hair neatly into place.

"Quickly now," she snapped, as though she hadn't just taken advantage of their absence to tidy up. "Alastor Moody will be waiting."

When Severus hesitated, Lily took a pinch of floo powder and stepped into the green flames. "Ministry of Magic," she said clearly. Then she was gone.

Despite everything, Severus was almost excited as he followed Lily into the fire. He had never been to the Ministry, and after years of hearing his friends grumble about the establishment and discuss infiltration by the Dark Lord, it had reached near-mythic proportions in Severus's imagination. The Ministry was the hulking safeguard of wizarding society—omnipresent, unshakeable, and deeply flawed.

As he tumbled from the fire and straightened, brushing soot from his sleeves, Severus was nearly blinded by the light streaming from overhead. He knew they were underground, but he could have sworn it was the early-morning sun glaring down on the room.

He and Lily stood in an enormous stone atrium with fireplaces ringing the walls and a towering fountain at the center. Around them, wizards were beginning to straggle in to work, bleary-eyed and clutching tall mugs of coffee. Severus was jostled aside by a witch with a teapot floating just above her shoulder; she muttered an apology, too sleepy to take note of Severus's youth and unusual dress.

Severus flinched when a hand closed on his shoulder—the witch from St. Mungo's had joined them. She marched them briskly to the far end of the atrium, where a dark corridor and a clattering lift awaited them. Lily glanced at Severus and shrugged as they clambered into the lift behind the floating teapot.

"You're to be on your best behavior," Cummings hissed out of the corner of her mouth as the lift jolted down. "Aurors have a reputation as a hardened lot, and Alastor Moody is infamous even among them."

Severus nodded sharply. He knew the name well enough.

"Level one. Auror headquarters."

By the time the cool female voice announced their destination, Severus, Lily, and Cummings were the only ones remaining in the lift. Severus stepped out before Cummings could herd him along, and peered down the long, shadowed corridor.

When Cummings strode forward, Severus grabbed Lily's wrist and pulled her close. "Let me talk," he whispered. "If Moody asks, you don't know why you're here. You're not involved."

"I'm not promising anything," Lily whispered, gently loosening Severus's hand. "Come on."

Fuming, Severus hurried after Cummings, who rapped smartly on the first door they came to.

"Alastor. I've brought the students."

The door swung open to reveal the auror, who stood at the center of a disappointingly ordinary room. Severus's first impression was one of surprise—Moody was _young_. He could only be a few years out of training. He must have been ruthless, to have gained a reputation so quickly.

"Thank you," Moody growled, dismissing Cummings with a wave of his scarred hand. "Sit."

Severus and Lily scrambled into heavy oak chairs at the end of Moody's desk, and he took a seat opposite them. His blue eyes were the most remarkable feature in a plain, sullen face.

"So. You kids have been taking an interest in the Dark Arts."

Though Severus couldn't deny this, he sat forward indignantly. "Why are we here? You can't do anything to us. I was only reading a library book—it's not like I've been cursing people!"

"Don't be daft, boy." Moody scowled at Severus. "You haven't been hauled in for punishment, just for questioning." His expression became graver still. "The _Prophet_ doesn't report everything, and some things are deliberately hushed up. So you might not have heard about the recent surge in Dark activity. All the evidence indicates that Lord Voldemort is intent on building himself an army, and if this goes on, he'll be a greater threat than Grindelwald ever was. You see our predicament."

Severus nodded silently.

"We're desperate for a lead," Moody said flatly. "You may be too young to have joined the Death Eaters, but I'd bet my life that you know the names of a fair few. And if you aren't willing to share, the Ministry will gladly keep tabs on you both. Lord Voldemort won't be pleased to have the likes of you in his ranks, when you can lead us straight to him."

Severus cast a panicked look in Lily's direction. He couldn't very well implicate the Malfoys and their cronies—if those names got out, the Dark Lord would personally see to it that he and Lily were silenced. It didn't take much imagination to guess what that would involve. But if he said nothing, Moody would use him as a scapegoat the next time the Death Eaters caused trouble.

"Please, sir," he said at last. "I'm only interested in the theory behind Dark magic, not actually using it. All I know about the Death Eaters are the same rumors the Ministry's been chasing. I can't give you any names."

Moody continued to stare at him, unblinking.

Recklessly Severus added, "Besides, if you Ministry people weren't so scared of the Dark Arts, you'd probably have a much better idea of how to go about stopping the Dar—You-Know-Who."

As the lift gave a distant rattle, Moody finally blinked and straightened. "An interesting suggestion," he said sarcastically. He clearly hadn't believed a word of it. "And what does the young lady have to say for herself?" He rounded on Lily.

"She's not involved," Severus said quickly. "She just gave me a ride to St. Mungo's, and—"

"And I believe she can speak for herself," Moody barked. "Go on."

Lily swallowed visibly. "I can't give you any names, but there's something else. When I was camping with my family, I ran across a werewolf."

She glanced at Severus as though seeking permission to continue, and he nodded infinitesimally. It was a good idea—Moody was certainly someone who could stop Greyback, and this information would distract him from questioning them further.

"The werewolf said he worked for You-Know-Who," Lily continued, "and he's targeting young boys, biting them young so they grow up ruthless."

"I see." Moody's eyes glittered with intensity. "And where did you happen across these werewolves?"

"Up north," Lily said, "just—"

The door banged open. Lily hiccupped in surprise, and Severus whirled.

Abraxas Malfoy stood in the doorway, a dangerous, icy smile on his face. "Morning, Alastor."

"Most people would knock," Moody said curtly.

Mr. Malfoy's lip curled. "There has been a misunderstanding. I am here to escort these students home, by order of the Hogwarts headmaster. Any interest they may have shown in the Dark Arts is purely theoretically and teacher-approved. Come, Severus, Evans. Good day, Alastor."

Young as Moody was, he did not appear willing to confront a Malfoy directly. Instead he watched in disgust as Severus and Lily stumbled to their feet and followed Mr. Malfoy from the office. Severus was cold with dread.

How much had Mr. Malfoy heard?"


End file.
